PrintPack 2019: Siegwerk’s focus is on product safety and performance at PrintPack

Siegwerk’s Bhiwadi site is now toluene-free and doesn’t use toluene in the manufacturing process. The other things are, developing pigment grades that are created directly for Siegwerk and that provide independence, less risk and lower costs at optimal performance levels.  The company produces polyurethane (PU) resins instead of purchasing them from third parties, which saves money and allows the German ink major to create PU-based inks, which provide the exact desired result. Siegwerk has a PU production facility in India.

A company spokesperson said, “The recent FSSAI notifications emphasising packaging safety and recommending that all packaging inks have to be compliant with IS 15495 norms had an impact at the show. Plus there are tighter BIS regulations imminent, PSR (product safety and regulatory)-compliant products that Siegwerk has had in its portfolio such as migration-optimised solvent-based gravure inks, LMLO (low migration low odour) UV-flexo inks and mineral-oil-free offset inks will see a sharp rise in demand in India. Our products in all these segments, well-established in developed countries over several years, will finally play an active role in the changing landscape, especially in food-packaging, or NPH (nutrition, pharma and health) applications at PrintPack." Siegwerk's basket of PSR-compliant inks and OPVs have been the products to look out for during the first four days of the show.

Siegwerk has also focuses on labels. This is the first time that a dedicated exclusive Label Zone has been created at PrintPack India 2019. This is part of a collaboration between ALPS (Association of Label Printers and Suppliers) and IPAMA, who are PrintPack's organisers. A press statement from Siegwerk stated, “There are several converting industry players who are investing in diverse fields and not limiting them to the hitherto silos of only flexible packaging or mono-cartons or labelling. Even brand owners seek a single proven vendor to offer all these multiple packaging options in order to achieve standardisation and economies of scale and buying."

Siegwerk is hoping that PrintPack will provide a platform to enable this cross-pollination, since “Siegwerk has offerings for all the value-streams of gravure, flexo and offset, and will be able to showcase and highlight all the advantages."

Siegwerk showcased its range of products

In 2016 Siegwerk launched the first LED-UV flexo inks for food and pharmaceutical packaging, UV inkjet inks for labels, sustainable water-based inks for paper and board applications and a new ink range for gravure printing, based on a polyurethane binder system and free of polyvinyl chloride (PVC).

“Our focus is mapping the market in terms of customer experience and what we need to change within Siegwerk. We are trying to meet customer’s expectations plus calibrate/ predict the manner in which the technology is moving," Ashish Pradhan, the CEO of Siegwerk said.

He added, “There is a lot more interest today. We see many Asian countries move towards compliant product safety and regulations. China has moved towards a completely toluene-free system. They are much ahead when you talk about strong norms against volatile organic compounds (VOC). That is the segment which India is moving towards. It might take a while to happen, and probably by 2020 it will be done."