Ajanta Packaging was among the first Indian label printers to have plants in two locations in the country – Daman and Baddi. It then expanded to Sharjah in the Middle East where it had to take on some of the largest global label printers. And then, more recently in the last two years it set up a plant near Bangkok in Thailand. When we met the company’s managing director, Chandan Khanna at interpack in Dusseldorf in 2013, his entire focus was on how to grow his company into a global business. While some Indian label printers were wondering how to sell their business to the next global player arriving at our shores, here was a businessman daring to scale up and take on new geographies.
At the time Khanna explained that it was not easy initially to make an impact in the Middle East – the well-known global players were there and of course Ajanta faced several constraints in terms of its own size and perceived scalability. But what came across from our meeting was his confidence in taking on the big guys – albeit in a step by step manner – and it seemed clear that he had the courage and the knowhow to leverage and scale up his company globally.
In its overseas locations, Ajanta gradually achieved the competitive breakthroughs that enabled it to penetrate the top end of those markets. Then it consolidated its capabilities and geared up its capacities paying full attention to global standards and norms in quality standards, safety, health and environment. The FMCG, healthcare, wellness, pharma, and food and beverages segments were amongst its customers and now in its world-class Thailand plant, Ajanta is also getting into the durables segment.
Ajanta mainly has high-end narrow web flexo presses with all the bells and whistles – 10-unit Nilpeter presses which combine flexo, gravure, screen and foil capability with high-end in-line finishing and converting. In its latest plantnear Bangkok, it has a highly configured Nilpeter flexo as well as an Iwasaki label press giving it a monthly capacity of a million square metres. Having achieved ISO 9001-2008, GMP and RS certifications for all of its plants, the Thailand plant has recently been FSC and UL certified for the white goods and durables segment.
Having understood and taken on some of the challenges of scaling up its operations globally, Ajanta achieved strong top-line growth in the past financial year. It is now exploring further expansion and investment opportunities both overseas and within the country. “To do something different has always been my passion and doing business in different places was always a dream,” says Khanna. “My family taught me that t is important to have both happy customers and happy employees. Fortunately my job to build a profitable global business has turned out to be a combination of my upbringing and what I always wanted to do.
