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Packaging growth

April 27, 2004

Speaking with industry insiders one gets the idea that not only is gravure dominant in India but that it is still growing at a high rate. One industry expert says that flexible packaging growth is about 20 per cent a year, and another adds that the demand for flexible packaging for milk products and edible oils is rising by 200 to 250 tons a month, that is, roughly by 5000 tons a year.

Although some industry experts feel it is too early, expansions in flexible film manufacturing capacity are being implemented by Jindal Polyester and Cosmo Films. Current Indian manufacture of all types of films is approximately 6 lakh tons (600,000) with some players predicting an annual demand growth of about 10 per cent.

Food related growth

At the same time it is felt that wide web flexo is the ideal technology for food related packaging. In this area a number of agro based and food related processing and packaging companies are tying up with multinational companies in joint ventures. For instance, the Adani group’s edible oil company set up a fifty-fifty joint venture with Wilmar Holdings of the US (the worlds second largest edible oil company) to form Adani-Wilmar in 1999. Adani-Wilmar has built the country’s largest oil refining plant at Gujarat’s Mundra port with modern integrated packaging lines as well. Parakh Foods in Maharashtra will soon become Cargill-Parakh.

The Indian consumption of edible oils in 2002-2003 was just under 10 million tons and 55 per cent of this was met by imports. New York based Bunge bought Hindustan Lever’s entire edible oil business in August 2003, including the well-known Dalda brand for Rs 90 crore (US$ 20 million). Bunge plans to relaunch the Dalda vanaspati (cooking medium) brand as well as other food products. For this purpose, Bunge, the largest shipper of soya bean oil to the country, has also acquired several other food processors and brands.

Flexible converters are under continuous price pressure from packaging buyers who are increasingly setting up their own packaging plants. The packaging buyers are for the first time in a very competitive situation as the high margins of 10 to 15 per cent in fast moving consumer goods are shrinking toward the more normal 5 per cent margins for commodities worldwide. This is a reflection of the prevalent competitive environment and the above 7 per cent GDP growth and improvements in communication, marketing, and distribution.

Gravure presses

With about 35 modern high-speed gravure lines running in the country, the base is still small and the addition of one fast new imported line displaces several smaller converters at a time when price realisations are under pressure. The gravure printers and converters are thus having to increase their efficiencies and this generally means an imported press that can print 250 tons a month compared to Indian presses that would most likely be able to turn out 100 to 150 tons of packaging a month (depending on the thickness of the substrate). Since the new imported gravure lines are often imported under the Export Credit Guarantee (EPCG) scheme, the top gravure printers hope to export as much as 30 per cent of production.

We can report that Bobst has already sold two Rotomec RS 1200 presses built in its Shanghai plant. A 10-colour press is to be installed at Flex Industries in Noida and an 8-colour at Lakshmi Packaging in Salem, near Bangalore.

Although there are innumerable local manufacturers, there are three manufacturers who produce high-speed machines with automation features and sleeve impression technology—Raulimex, Expert, and Kuster Calico. These three companies use Rossini sleeve systems. Raulimex has already put in 4 hi-speed gravure lines this year that are running at 250 meters a minute. Expert, based in Bangalore was a first time drupa exhibitor this year and has several machines running outside the country. Kuster Calico is a joint venture of Eduard Kuster of Germany and the Calico Industrial Engineers.

A significant number of the new gravure lines are expected in North India. This coincides with the news that some of the FMCG manufacturers are setting up plants in Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal to take advantage of the ten-year tax holiday offered by these states for setting up plants in certain districts.

Flexo Wide web flexo has also taken off with four to five new machines likely to be imported this year. As we have written earlier, in the past year several presses from W&H and one from Fischer and Krecke were ordered by flexible converters in Gujarat and Maharashtra. However, one can expect a bit more geographic diversity this year. A bit further afield, Bobst has sold an 8-colour Schiavi flexo press to Lanka Plastics in Colombo. At some point later this year, Bobst is planning to host an open house event at Lanka Plastics.

It is felt that that the food grade packaging of large manufacturers of edible oils and milk companies will require several more high speed gearless flexo presses from manufacturers such as W&H, F&K and Bobst Schiavi.

Coater laminators

The Schiavi Unica CL 660 multipurpose coater-laminator launched at drupa, has already been sold to ITC’s Packaging Division near Chennai. ITC’s Unica CL 660 should be commissioned in the last quarter of 2004. The Unica CL 660 is designed for various options using interchangeable dedicated trolleys for dry bond, solventless and wet lamination, PVCdC coating, in register 1-colour printing and in register cold sealing with a new technology by Registron. The Unica is suited to water-based adhesives. In fact it is quite likely that a second Unica CL660 will also come to India quite soon.

Bobst has reported the sale of 4 of its new Titan SR8 slitter rewinders, (shown at drupa), to customers in Turkey, India and Columbia. The Indian customer Huhtamki owned Paper Products Limited, bought two.

Board packaging

The leading board printing and converting companies continue to grow at a very high rate and several companies are adding automated presses with coaters that include UV interstage curing capability or are at least “UV ready.” Again North India seems to be adding the most capacity with Kumar Printers new Heidelberg CD102-6 in Manesar, Borkar Packagings Roland 706 in Baddi, International Print-O-Pac’s Roland 706 in Noida, and with HBD Packaging’s new plant in Noida which has just begun construction.

International Print-O-Pac’s Roland 706 with coater is the first machine in the country with UV interstage curing installed and not merely “UV ready.” The press should be commissioned by end-August and it will have MAN Roland’s ColorPilot closed loop colour scanning and control system. The plant is also being upgraded with the Pecom control system that will link its three 700 format presses, the 8-colour 708, the 705 and the new 706 with coater.

Parksons Packaging has also purchased its third 6-colour plus coater press, this time a KBA Rapida 105. This machine will go into the recently expanded Daman plant which will now be expanded again. Parksons have also upgraded to an even faster folder gluer from Bobst. As reported earlier, Parksons Packaging became the first board packaging printer to purchase a CtP in India, a Screen 8-up PT-R8000II, driven by an Esko-Graphics FlexRip.

Bobst India continues to do well in the board packaging sector with combined sales of about 25 die-cutters and folder gluers in the past year. Drupa has led to many sales especially of folder gluers. Among others, Nutech’s packaging plant in Noida which already has two 6-colour plus coater presses and a Sugano autoplaten die-cutter, has purchased a Bobst Amazon folder-gluer. Nutech’s Amazon 70 will run at 300 meters per minute and has been purchased with options for pharmaceutical catch covers, envelopes, and hot melt glue used for polycoated ice-cream cartons.