BOBST & Partners roadshow on sustainable solutions attracts Kenya’s flexible packaging and label industry

“Given the country’s economic outlook, improved business confidence and development of the local infrastructure, there is huge potential for the local industry to benefit from leading-edge technology” commented Eric Pavone, Business Development Director of BOBST Business Unit Web-fed “The pace of innovation in the global industry towards increasing productivity in a sustainable way is fast. We are at the forefront of the change, hence it was time to return to Kenya for an update on all the advances made since our previous roadshow in 2014”.
 
With market trends firmly set towards thinner substrates and a circular economy, vacuum metallizing and lamination presentations gave an overview of the state-of-the-art innovations contributing to meeting the sustainability challenge. These included transparent and metallized barrier solutions such as the AlOx Integrated Conversion Solution, or the AluBond® process that can be produced on BOBST vacuum metallizers. Sustainability of both the production process and the end-products was the focus of the overview of lamination equipment. Here the combined action of the drying technology and coating systems enable lower adhesive coating weights, greatly reduced energy consumption and monomer-free processes.
 
The future of flexo printing with extended color gamut (ECG) technology drew great interest from the audience. In narrow and mid-web inline flexo, lines like the M5 provide a huge appeal for converters thanks to the unique BOBST Digital Flexo technology and their flexibility of configuration suitable for labels, flexible and carton packaging production.
 

Showing the 7-color ECG fingerprint printed on BOBST 20SEVEN CI flexo press

In wide-web CI flexo printing, the new technical features of the 20SEVEN press relating to press vibrations, ink metering and drying at high speed, combine with the smartGPS system to bring unprecedented consistency, accuracy and repeatability to the flexo printing process.
 
For gravure printing, the latest innovations that succeed in making the production efficient, sustainable and automated were illustrated on two of BOBST’s best-selling presses. The RS 5002for flexible packaging applications and the RS 6003 platform with dedicated configurations that can handle a very broad spectrum of flexible material application requirements.
 
The overview of the capabilities that BOBST can deploy in the region in terms of technical support and services brought the event to a successful conclusion.
 
“Kenya has a concrete concern about disposal of plastic waste. The process efficiency and sustainability delivered by our equipment and the dedicated solutions for recyclable packaging truly hit the mark with participants. A number of promising projects for flexible packaging and labels applications have taken off as a result of the roadshow” concluded Eric Pavone.

Bobst Mex SA, Switzerland