W&H, Miraclon, Apex International and Tesa are organizing a packaging summit

W&H — Speakers during the post-summit question and answer session

Four prominent players in the field of packaging printing – Windmoller & Holscher (W&H), Miraclon, Apex International and Tesa – joined forces to organize a conference on packaging, with a special emphasis on flexographic printing. The event on May 3 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Ahmedabad attracted stakeholders from across the flexible packaging value chain and covered key themes including cost integration, efficiency and sustainability in packaging.

Anuj Sahni, Sales and Marketing Director at W&H, started the meeting with a welcome address, highlighting the industry’s focus on sustainability and the complementary nature of flexographic and gravure printing technologies. Sahni emphasized the importance of flexible packaging converters that adapt to customer requirements, advocating a multifaceted approach that includes both flexo and gravure technologies.

“People often ask us whether rotogravure is a better process or flexo. We do not consider them as two competing processes. We see flexo as a complementary process to gravure printing. Today, flexible packaging converters are service providers and must be ready to deliver whatever the customer requests. Processors with gravure printing technology should definitely look at flexo,” he says.

Sunil Kumar, technical sales consultant at W&H, delved into the integration of efficiency and sustainability, focusing on technical aspects such as barrier films and varnishes. Kumar presented W&H solutions, including EASY-COL, a fully integrated on-press color management system, and Vision, an integrated web monitoring and inspection system.

Mahesh Mense, Sales Manager – Indian Peninsula, Apex International, discussed trends and innovations in flexographic printing, highlighting advances in press technology, plates, anilox rolls, tapes and inks. Mense spoke about the evolution of Apex International’s GTT grid technology, which was launched 12 years ago. He pointed out the advantage that GTT has over conventional anilox rolls. GTT offers benefits such as consistency and cost efficiency. A major advantage of the GTT technology is the ink waste and the long life of the doctor blades, he said.

Hersh Lulla, Marketing Manager – Asia Pacific Region at Miraclon, provided insight into developments in flexo printing and emphasized the importance of efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Lulla also highlighted Miraclon’s Flexcel NX digital platemaking system.

Tesa’s Stephanie Lee discussed Tesa Softprint plate mounting tapes for flexographic printing and outlined their benefits, such as fast job preparation, easy disassembly and adaptability to different climatic conditions. Lee talked about Tesa’s participation in drupa 2024, a leading trade fair for printing technologies.

The summit provided a platform for industry leaders to share insights and strategies aimed at driving packaging efficiency and sustainability, further demonstrating W&H, Miraclon, Apex International and Tesa’s commitment to driving innovation in flexographic printing ecosystem was reaffirmed.

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