Manjushree Technopack is the leading Indian manufacturer of PET pre-forms for the beverage packaging industry. Rajat Kedia, director of Manjushree Technopack, is a specialist in patents, rights and trademarks. He looks after product development, technology, automation and productivity within the company’s operations and is also responsible for Mphinite, Manjushree’s design and consulting arm, which specializes in design, engineering and deployment of rigid packaging solutions for the FMCG vertical.
In our conversation with Rajat Kedia we discussed the company’s recent installation of a PE blown film line form ulti-layer shrink-films at the company’s Bidadi plant near Bengaluru. It was quite clear that apart from PET and shrink-film packaging,
Kedia is both knowledgeable and concerned about the sustainability and environmental aspects of packaging – a subjectthatwe planto takeup atlengthwithhimat
length in subsequent issues of Packaging South Asia.
Naresh Khanna: Let me start by asking, why did the promoters of Manjushree Technopack Limited which was listed on the stock exchange and growing at high (double-digit) annual rates, decide to take the company private. Was this linked to going in for private equity investment by Kedara Capital?
Rajat Kedia: Taking the company private in the 2014-15 financial year was a strategic decision by us, let us say for a variety of competitive reasons. As far as taking on
private equity investment, there were multiple benefits in taking on an equity investor who had experience in the packaging domainto fuel our expansion plans. We got the capital to grow, a wealth of knowledge based on global experience and very professional help in various industrial and best practices. Some of these might have taken us a bit longer to put in place and master if we had continued to just do it on
our own.
NK: What does the shrink-film project do for your PET pre-form customers including many of the global beverage brands in the country?
RK: Actually this expansion or diversification of multi-layer polyethylene (PE)
shrink-filmwas requested by ourPET bottle customers. They are looking forreliable
and high-quality one-stop suppliers. In the future perhaps the purchasing departments of packaging plants need not coordinate with four different suppliers for preforms, labels, closures and caps and shrink-films. Our ultimate aim is also to become a one-stop supplierto the beverage packaging industry.
NK: What made you go in for the Reifenhauser Evolution blown film line?
RK: We were looking atthe very top ofthe range where there may only be one other supplier. In any case,the Reifenhauser Evolution Ultra Range extruderis very advanced as far as high output blown film cooling systems are concerned. Its Ultra
Cool chilling technology provides very high quality and consistency of output with
collation shrink recipes at 700 kilograms an hour. This means we can produce 13 to
15 tonnes of PE shrink-films a day depending on the product mix.
No human intervention is needed as the bubble goes up and it is continuously monitored. The quality and thickness of the PE film bubble renders film as wide as
2.6 metres, is maintained by continuous monitoring and the closed loop correction
built into the system. After slitting, multiple Evolution WP winders provide rolls of
widths needed for shrink packaging of almost all sizes of products.
NK: Are you looking only at your beverage packaging customers or other packaging segments as well?
RK: While for beverage packaging the industry average thickness of PE shrinkfilmsmay be between60 and 80microns, ournewline canproducePE films from25
to 200 microns. Although the investment was based mainly on our existing beverage customers, we have discovered that there are many other speciality applications for shrink-films. Several bottles or other primary packs can be packed togetherin a cleartransparent shrink-film pack and put directly on the supermarket shelf.
A customer can see the attractive primary packaging and in many cases even the
product itself and conveniently pick up let’s say, a multiple pack of the product.
PE shrink films are used for protecting and displaying many products, even magazines, books and notebooks. Increasingly we are also seeing instances of PE
shrink-films replacing stretch films for packaging a variety of industrial components and parts and products such as generators and car tyres. For instance tyrepackagingusingPEshrink-filmmakes it completely transparentinside andout and
can be both transported safely and look good on a shelf with all the brand and size
and pressure markings visible.
Reifenhauser India@drupa Another 6 to 7 CI flexo press installs in India in 2016
Reifenhäuser(India) Marketing Ltd. had an eventful drupa 2016 where it struck multiple deals with leading players in the flexible packaging and labels industry. One of the highlights was an agreement signed for a Comexi F2 MB flexographic press and a 5-layer co-extrusion blown film line to Kolkata-based Creative Polypack, a leader in flexible packaging in the region.
“This new investment by Creative Polypack will help in their further expansionand grow thin the flexible packaging industry. This is also an indication of greater penetration of flexographic technology in the Indian packaging industry,” says Manish Mehta, managing director of Reifenhäuser(India) Marketing.
According to Mehta, the Indian packaging industry will continue to see increase in the number of installations of flexographic presses in coming years. “The success of the technology has been due to substantial improvementin the prepress technology and advent of gear less presses.We expect another six to seven flexographic presses to be installed in the country in the remaining part of 2016, and will try to get a good share of these,” added Mehta.
In addition to Comexi, RIML also inked deals to sell AVT defect inspection system to Mumbai-based Webtech Labels and Hyderabadbased Pragati. Increased adoption of
defect detection systems is another trend that Mehta believes will become widespread in the packaging industry. RIML already has more than 100 installations of AVT inspection systems in India and is the market leader in the country in this category of quality control and automation equipment. “The share of AVT inspection systems is substantial across India and the installation base is increasing at a rapid pace and we expect the trend to continue,” he says.
Reifenhäuser (India), Creative Polypack and Comexi teams at drupa 2016Apart from an exciting drupa RIML has implemented some important installations inthe recent months aswell. The highlight has been installation of the 3-layer co-extrusion blown film line from Reifenhäuser Blown Film GmbH, Germany at Bangalore’s Manjushree Technopack Limited. Reifenhäuser Blown Film supplied its third generation Evolution series of blown film line with a face width of 2600 mm various film applications with a major focus on collation shrink films required by Manjushree, at their Bidadi plant located in Bangalore.
“We have known Manjushree for a very long time but this is our first official big business with the company. Manjushree is a major PET solution provider to leading beverage players in the country and with this new investment they can now venture into shrink film packaging. This is a natural progression for the company,” Mehta says.
Another 3-layer co-extrusion blown film line of 2600 mm width has recently been successfully and independently installed by RIML’s service team at Chemco Group’s Vadodara plant.
Finally, talking about RIML’s success, Mehta says the biggest reason is that there is a highly trained technical support team which fully takes care of not only local clients but overseas customers as well in terms of installation, commissioning and aftersales support. “We make sure the customer is fully satisfied with the performance of the machine and the required technical services. That is the reason for our recent success,” he concludes.
