PETpla.net Insider 05 / 2016

CAPPING / CLOSURES 31 PET planet insider Vol. 17 No. 05/16 www.petpla.net Quality is Bericap’s top priority. 29/11 that you introduced last year the end of the story? C. Krautkrämer: For the HexaLite, its low weight is surely a decisive factor. But at some point, the con- sumer can no longer properly use the bottle. The various regions possess various acceptability limits for this, but the fact is that today, ONLY light weight is only one aspect amongst many. A. Büchler: Can you name examples? C. Krautkrämer: Take a look at the Asian market; consum- ers are highly sensitive towards counterfeit products. There, a closure has to have significantly higher requirements of genu- ineness i.e. Tamper Evidence, than in other regions. This is as true for the beverage indus- try as it is for example for the agricultural industry. The farmers want to be sure that the highly priced chemicals do actually contain the chemicals for which they have paid. But we do everything to stay ahead. A. Büchler: Let’s stay in Asia. In China you’re operating two facilities that we’ll visit on the coming Editor- mobil China Road Show. One near Shanghai, one near Shenzhen. What can we expect there? C. Krautkrämer: Actually, you only need to visit a single facility; both companies are managed by the same management team. Still it’s important in China – as with other countries of the world – that you have local people in the management. In the long term we are thinking of building one facility each for the north and the west, to strengthen the local presence, to be able to get a handle on the high cost of logistics in China, but also to be able to reflect the cultural diversity of China. A. Büchler: In Singapore, you have moved your facility to Malaysia. What were the reasons? C. Krautkrämer: We could no longer expand in Singapore and also, the infrastructure no longer conformed to our expectations. Now we have a facility according our best practice which allows us to fulfil requirements of specific markets which we could not guarantee before. For example the micro biological controlled produc- tion for the still water market. So we just went over the border with a new facility. A. Büchler: Your facilities are highly standardised. Worldwide you install the same machines. So far you have always had an impressive piping and supply infrastructure for the injection moulding machines in your facilities; in the new buildings this has now disappeared. Has this infrastructure not proven successful? C. Krautkrämer: Well, the global standardisation gives us the advan- tage to follow the best practice and same procedures for each product in every company. This enables us to offer the same product to one customer in various countries in the world. Further it provides us back up supplies and support within the team itself. Regarding the infrastructure itself, all new companies which are a green field project these installa- tions are installed in the basement for better operation, cleanliness, micro biological controlled environment etc. A. Büchler: When touring your facilities, the significant portion of all- electric machines also stands out. C. Krautkrämer: We had already experimented with all-electric machines more than 20 years ago. Today, of our 900 injection machines, about half are all-electric. Once the all-electric machines are also com- mercially available at higher classes of clamping force, we will also try these out. A. Büchler: This brings us to the old discussion; why the focus on injec- tion moulding and why not on also on compression moulding? C. Kraut- krämer: Compres- sion moulding is surely justified in many areas; we had nine installed systems ourselves. But about 15 years ago I personally advocated, that we concentrate ourselves on injec- tion moulding. Our tools are suited for this; we have the same hole patterns on our machines worldwide so that all tools can run anywhere; all our staff members are trained for injection moulding, so we would have to put in a huge effort to operate a rotary machine just as efficiently. In the end the product is what counts, we need to supply best quality to our customers. We achieve this through the right combination of products, machines, and tools and a focus on customers A. Büchler: Thank you very much Mr Krautkrämer. www.bericap.com