Specialisation is not a choice — The Noel D'Cunha Sunday Column

Pulkit Chhaparia does not romanticise entrepreneurship. When he addresses the audience at Print and Beyond 2025, he speaks less like a keynote speaker and more like someone reconstructing a set of hard-earned lessons.

“I have been in this industry for only 12 years,” he says. “It is not a very long journey.”

Yet in those 12 years, he has built Cambay Foodservices Packaging into a 100 percent export-oriented business supplying the US, UK and EU markets, shipping close to 150 containers every month. It is a first-generation enterprise. His father spent four decades in textiles. Packaging was his own decision, and he admits that in the early years he entered the industry with more enthusiasm than structured understanding.

“I did not see an offset machine three months before I started my business,” he says. “I learned it the hard way.”

That phrase, learned it the hard way, recurs throughout his presentation. It frames his central message. In a de globalising world where tariffs, non tariff barriers, Chinese overcapacity and buyer consolidation are reshaping global trade, Indian packaging companies cannot afford to remain generic. Specialisation, he argues, is no longer a strategic option. It is a structural necessity.

“In exports, there is no other way,” he says. “You cannot be a generic supplier of everything and compete with the best in the world.”

From saying yes to saying no

Cambay did not begin as a specialised exporter. Until 2018, it operated as a domestic industrial packaging producer supplying a variety of segments. Like many growing companies, it responded to opportunity rather than defining a narrow domain. When machinery was acquired under EPCG licences, export obligations followed, and what initially felt like compliance pressure forced the company to look outward.

“I started travelling all over the world in nervousness,” Chhaparia says. “I was asking how to start exporting.”

Those travels became transformative. In analysing global markets, he recognised that certain packaging segments offered stronger alignment between production efficiency and end-use demand. These applications were driven directly by consumption rather than by another manufacturer’s output cycle, allowing greater predictability and operational focus. The ability to standardise at scale and build repeatable systems made the segment structurally attractive. That insight informed the company’s long-term positioning.

From 2018 onwards, Cambay transitioned steadily toward a 100 percent export-oriented model focused exclusively on food service packaging. That shift required turning down work in other categories. It also required confronting earlier mistakes. “I said yes to everything,” he admits. “That was one of my biggest mistakes.”

In the early years, he was obsessed with machines. As an engineer, technology and infrastructure attracted him. He invested heavily in equipment. Turnover grew. But cash flow management lagged. By 2015 and 2016, emergency loans were required to sustain operations. “As a young company, you are obsessed with the top line,” he says. “But turnover is not the only parameter of business success.”

He also realised that trying to replicate established diversified packaging leaders was a strategic error. “You need not run the same race as somebody else,” he says. “You can create your own race.” For Cambay, that race became food service packaging exports.

A global market that is tightening

The export landscape that Cambay now operates in is markedly different from a decade ago. Chhaparia describes it as a market shaped less by cost arbitrage and more by political and structural realignment.

“There are nationalistic right-wing governments across the world,” he says. “Policies are being driven accordingly.”

Tariffs are the visible instruments of protectionism. But he stresses that non tariff barriers often have greater operational impact. Environmental compliance requirements, food contact regulations, documentation standards and sustainability disclosures have tightened significantly in Europe and the United States. Even where free trade agreements exist, exporters must navigate dense regulatory frameworks.

For food service packaging, this includes testing for heavy metals, migration limits and coating disclosures. “Quality is extremely important,” he says. “But more than quality, it is very important to produce goods consistently with the same quality.”

Chinese overcapacity compounds the challenge. “There is immense pressure from Chinese exports,” he says. “In terms of price, in terms of volume.” With significant excess capacity, Chinese suppliers compete aggressively on cost. For Indian converters, competing solely on price is unsustainable.

Meanwhile, the packaging industry globally has undergone consolidation. “Business is shifting to large scale corporations,” Chhaparia says. Mergers and acquisitions have concentrated buying power into fewer hands. Large multinational buyers operate with centralised procurement systems and global quality benchmarks. They expect digital integration and seamless communication. They negotiate hard.

Smaller importers, he notes, have become increasingly risk averse. Many have reduced exposure or exited the market altogether. The result is that exporters increasingly deal with larger, more demanding clients.

Logistics volatility adds further uncertainty. Shipping routes have been disrupted by geopolitical tensions. Freight rates fluctuate. Transit times are less predictable. Working capital planning becomes tighter and more complex. In this environment, he argues, generalists struggle. “When you are specialised, it is not easy to replace you,” he says.

He offers a practical example. During periods of tariff volatility in the United States, Cambay retained most of its clients. “Even if it was 50 percent tariffs, nobody cancelled the orders,” he says. “They paid higher duties and still got the goods from us.”

The reason, he insists, is not price. It is specialisation. The specific product capabilities Cambay developed were not easily substituted.

Operational clarity through focus

For Chhaparia, specialisation is not a branding exercise. It is operational clarity.

“If you are doing pharmaceutical packaging, and along with that food service packaging and tonnes of other things, you are going to end up with different kinds of inventory,” he says. Managing diverse raw materials, coatings and compliance standards across unrelated segments increases complexity and ties up working capital.

“It is unreasonable to demand inventory control without having specialisation,” he adds.

By focusing exclusively on food service packaging, Cambay consolidates raw material procurement. Purchase efficiency improves because volumes are concentrated. Vendor relationships deepen. Suppliers are more willing to invest in proximity and reliability when demand is predictable.

“Developing vendors close by is very important in a de risked world,” he says. “But you can only do that if you have scale.”

Quality systems also benefit from repetition. Producing similar products consistently allows teams to refine process controls and detect deviations early. “Adherence to quality systems comes only when you are doing a particular job repeatedly,” he says.

Automation investments become purposeful rather than speculative. Food service packaging, with its large job sizes, demands specific configurations. Investing in automation tailored to that niche ensures utilisation and return on capital. “If you want to really automate your operations, please find your niche,” he says.

Backward integration follows the same logic. Cambay invested in high end coating lines for barrier applications specific to food contact packaging. Such capital expenditure would not be viable as a side activity.

Depth creates differentiation

Chhaparia also challenges the industry’s use of buzzwords.

“Consultancy led sales is a very good jargon,” he says. “But unless you are absolutely thorough with a particular industry, how are you going to consult somebody who is already in that industry?”

In food service packaging, depth includes understanding how products behave under heat, freezing or ambient conditions. It involves knowing migration parameters and regulatory frameworks. Without this knowledge, conversations remain transactional.

High value-added machinery investments must align with this depth. Installing specialised equipment for segments that are not core only dilutes focus. “Rather than putting eggs in different baskets, decide on a particular sector,” he says. “Invest well in high-end value-added machines and reap the benefits.”

He is blunt about the consequences of not doing so. “The buyers have unreasonable power because we do not know what we are good at,” he says. “Unless we find our own niche as a company, the buyers are always going to take advantage.”

Consistency, systems and the Indian gap

Quality, in Chhaparia’s view, extends beyond product performance. It includes communication and systems integration.

“For basic things like when is the shipment going to be dispatched, they should not have to send us an email,” he says. Cambay integrates its internal systems with client systems, allowing shared visibility of dispatch data and order status.

“Why does DHL share tracking details,” he asks. “Because it cannot handle such large amounts of inquiries.”

Consistency is critical. “Even if it is for better, you cannot change quality in every lot,” he says. Buyers expect predictability. Variation, even positive, can disrupt supply chains.

On certification, he notes that European food contact regulations are stringent. In India, frameworks specific to food packaging remain limited. “We need a certificate or regulation specifically certifying food packaging,” he says, urging greater engagement between industry bodies and government.

A focused path forward

Although Cambay is currently export focused, Chhaparia sees potential in India’s growing food service market. However, he describes it as fragmented.

“In Europe or the US, there is a fixed chain,” he says. “There are importers, national distributors, regional distributors and city distributors. In India, everybody is taking a shot at everything.”

As distribution hierarchies mature, he expects the Indian market to become more structured and attractive. When that happens, the same principles of specialisation and certification will determine leadership.

In the end, his message is clear and grounded in lived experience. “In exports, there is no other way,” he repeats. “You cannot be generic and compete with the best in the world.”

For Indian packaging converters navigating a tightening global landscape, that may be less a warning and more a roadmap.