High Performance UV/LED Inks: Bhaumik Mehta’s ink fidelity

Bhaumik Mehta, director of Flueron Inks, grew up absorbing the language of inks and paper through the peripheral conversations of a family-run business. That early exposure shaped a familiarity that later became commitment. For Mehta, the printing inks industry is less a sector of commerce and more a “lab of constant, high-stakes evolution.”

Mehta's formal preparation was rigorous: a Bachelor of Technology in Paints and Coatings from the University Department of Chemical Technology (UDCT, now Institute of Chemical Technology) Mumbai, followed by a master’s in science from Eastern Michigan University. In the United States, his initiation was swift and formative. He recalls a period interning at Flint Ink headquarters, where he was assigned to the UV paste inks team, an experience defined by a moment of awe before a KBA press. It was there that Mehta witnessed "the sheer speed and precision at which the printing press could reproduce results," and felt the immediate, visceral reward of formulating an ink and testing it on-site.

The next decade refined his expertise. He spent two years at Hexion Speciality Chemicals, then eight years with Ink Systems Inc in Los Angeles, becoming an authority in the precise art of troubleshooting and formulating UV/EB inks and coatings. This was a chapter of technical mastery, where he came to grips with the commercial ramifications of raw materials.

The shift to the Indian context in 2015, when he joined Flueron Inks, marked a profound inflection point. It was a transition from the "easy resourcefulness" of the American supply chain to the "challenging availability of raw materials" in India. Yet, it was this friction that forged his company’s success. He gathered a core of dedicated chemists and formulators, channelling their collective ingenuity to become a top provider of customised UV ink solutions — a particularly "enriching" process of growth rooted in localised understanding.

Mehta’s gaze is fixed on the horizon of what the industry could be. He has borne witness to the seismic technological shifts: the move from conventional, petroleum-distillate offset inks to EB-curable paste inks racing at 20,000 impressions per hour; the displacement of Toluene-based environments by NTNK (Non-Toluene, Non-Ketone) solutions; and the almost sci-fi spectacle of high-speed web Inkjet printing delivering variable data at 120-metres per minute.

For Mehta, the pressing challenges of the present are more technological. He sees an industry suffering from "unawareness or lack of knowledge on environmentally and socially conscious use of raw materials." The demand, as he frames it, is for the sector to "mature quicker" and adopt materials chosen "with responsibility to the package safety and human interactions." Further, the persistent struggle to attract, train, and retain a new generation of smart human capital keeps "innovation and growth an elusive goal."

His approach to leadership is grounded in pragmatism and trust: he champions investment in both technology and people, and insists on operational efficiency, often by identifying redundancies and leveraging technology for easier, collaborative work strategies. This commitment to structure enabled his most successful recent initiative. During the early days of the pandemic, when site visits were impossible, his team implemented a custom-built, organisation-wide inventory management and traceability software, fully integrated with their ERP. This system provides end-to-end supply chain visibility—a critical layer of trust and manufacturing compliance for clients in sensitive sectors like food and pharma packaging.

For the future, he sees packaging safety and material compliance as the key drivers, arguing that collaboration is the only way to facilitate industry-wide, sustainable growth. He is emphatic that competition must be with "science based products and not with cost based structures."

Having dedicated two decades to the field, Mehta’s driving passion remains the "global need for science backed and innovative inks." He believes India possesses an "immense potential" to deliver customised printing solutions to the world. He hopes that his work will ultimately inspire the next generation to raise the bar, making India an "elite printing ink manufacturing hub."

His equilibrium is found in a methodical balance: four days a week in the factory and lab, one day for administration, and two days which are dedicated to the family. Even with the inevitable disruption of travel, he carves out time for self-work, meditation, and the quieter pursuits of learning to play chess and tracking basketball trivia. When he retires, he envisions a continued role, mentoring professionals and helping them realise the vision of a world-class facility that innovates and profits from the ink products that colour the world.

Editorial inputs recieved from AIPIMA's InkNews magazine for the article.