The Surya Food and Agro group is well known for its snacks and juices and especially for Priyagold biscuits. An extensive user of BOPP and BOPET films for its packaging, the company’s backward integration to produce high-quality films was established as a subsidiary in 2020, known as Surya Global Flexifilms. The subsidiary’s new facility in the Yeida industrial area near the upcoming Jewar airport ordered two 8.7 meter-wide Brückner BOPP film lines – of which the first was installed in the third quarter of 2022. The second 8.7-meter wide line is expected at the end of 2023 for installation at the beginning of 2024.
Surya Global Flexifilms also purchased three Bobst Expert K5 2900 metallizers, the first of which was installed in 2022, with the second to be installed in Q2 of 2023 and the third to be installed by the end of the year. Running since last year, the first Expert K5 metallizer incorporates a High Rate source which gives a higher speed of operation and reduced distance between the boats for better coating uniformity. It also includes a 700mm coating drum, the largest in the industry and unique to the Expert K5, to improve collection efficiency by 16%. The improved productivity enables cost saving in the production of high-quality metalized films.
The second metallizer when it is commissioned later this year, will contain several additional features to those on the first machine, such as the Bobst’s AluBond process and the Bobst Hawkeye inline optical density control and defect monitoring system. The AluBond technology improves metal adhesion and dyne level on the most common film substrates as well as enhancing the barrier levels on polyolefin-based substrates such as BOPP.
At full metallizer speed, Hawkeye detects, counts, and categorizes pinholes and other defects, alerting the operator to take steps to rectify these immediately which results in less film waste. The third metalizer to be installed will be a twin of the first machine, which means by the end of 2023, Surya Flexifilms will have three Bobst metallizers running in its modern factory.
Commenting on the purchases, Shekhar Agarwal, chairman of Surya Global Flexifilms, said, “When we decided to start producing our own metalized film in-house, we wanted a company we could trust. Bobst has a great reputation in the market, and we had heard great things about AluBond. We are very happy with the first machine which is producing high-quality film and look forward to our other two machines being installed so we can start to produce AluBond film.”
