Growth plans outlined

Speaking at a press conference at the FachPack trade show in Germany, Hans-Joachim Boekstegers, director and CEO of Multivac, gave an overview of the current development of the business, as well as the packaging trends.

He reported a turnover of around €1.1 bn. in 2018, representing a 7.7% growth in turnover. "Despite many economic and political uncertainties, we are expecting a slight growth in turnover for the current business year,"said Boekstegers.

He outlined the continued expansion of production capacity including a new Center of Excellence for slicers and automation solutions, currently being built at the company's headquarters in Wolfertschwenden, which is due for completion in 2020. The company is also working on a greenfield site of around 9,000 square metres at the Bruckmühl facility. A new Center of Excellence for meat portioning machines is also currently being built there, and this will also be put into operation in 2020. The highlight of Bruckmühl is an Application Center, which is specifically designed for the needs of customers.

Boekstegers also explained the business' focus on sustainability moving forward. "When it comes to sustainable packaging solutions, we are the partner of choice," he said. "We are raising the awareness of sustainable packaging concepts among our customers worldwide. We are now multiplying our sustainable concepts worldwide, even in those regions, where we have not yet seen an active demand for these solutions."

He explained how the Multivac product portfolio includes a wide range of sustainable packaging concepts, which make a significant contribution to reducing the packaging material used to produce packs. Other concepts are based on the use of renewable raw materials or fully recyclable films such as for example mono plastics, or alternatively paper fibre-based packaging materials.