PETpla.net Insider 12 / 2019

PREFORM PRODUCTION PET planet Insider Vol. 20 No. 12/19 www.petpla.net 24 Medium-sized company from Bangalore invests in new equipment Extension to the portfolio of preforms by Kay Barton April 2019, We met: Mr Madhav Jagani, Director Marketing Mr Harshit Vankani, Director Finance Fillenpac, which was founded as a converter, less than five years ago and is based in the north-west of Bangalore, specialises in preform and bottle production. Within a year, the company – led by Mr Madhav Jagani, Marketing Direc- tor and Mr Harshit Vankani, Finance Director – invested in a fully-electric Husky HP 180 with 40 cavities. It did so in the quest to win new customers, while offering existing custom- ers added value in terms of quality. What started out as an experiment opened up new avenues for growth. It’s a deci- sion that is now, clearly, paying off. Founded in 2015 as the sister company of Crystal Polymers, Fillen- pac ultimately outgrew its subsidiary role and acquired its parent company in 2012. Change and expansion have continued; over the past two years it has seen revenues grow by approxi- mately 200%. “This year, business has been very buoyant; we’ve had between 30 and 40 enquiries so far alone,” said Mr Jagani. While the size of Fillenpac in the Peenya Industrial Area in Bangalore is still currently manageable, it looked to us during our visit as if it using pretty much all the available space in its cur- rent premises. This was confirmed by the revelation that expansion is already planned to take place this year. The company has been using injec- tion moulding equipment from Larsen & Toubro and Ferromatik Milacron in the manufacture of preforms and 20l water containers, from the day it first opened its doors. The decision to enter the world of the Husky was taken quite early in its existence. “We wanted to have a reliable preform production machine on board, whose products would provide high quality added value for our existing and potential customers,” Mr Jagani reported. “In 2016, we opted for a Husky system – not least, because of the accommodating approach they took during the negotiations, and the prom- ise that we would benefit from three years’ after-sales service.” As we left the office suite and entered the production hall, we saw the latest baby in the machine park straight away. The Husky machine was undergoing scheduled maintenance and wasn’t running while we were at the plant but Mr Jagani told us that it is being used more and more. At first, it was needed only weekly; it is now being used every day. “We have six customers, all situated in and around Bangalore, who currently generate all of our workload,” Mr Jagani stated. The four machines from Larsen & Toubro and Ferromatik manufacture preforms in the 28mm Alaska range; the Husky machine produces 28mm preforms for CSD and hotfill. “The material savings in necks that we have achieved with the Husky have been welcomed very warmly by the customers. The preforms we are making are 0.3 g lighter in this area than comparable preforms from com- petitors, while maintaining the same quality,” Madhav Jagani explained. We were advised that the lighter pre- forms are now being tried out for the first time by customers in the state of Tamil Nadu. Since January, Fillenpac has also been able to offer hot-fill pre- forms. Around 75% of the preforms and PET containers it produces go to bottlers of water and beverages, 15% to the edible oil industry, and 10% to manufacturers of jars. Within the 930m 2 facility, the company’s team of 32 processes approximately 8 t of PET material per day. “We are looking to the future posi- tively and are now considering whether to open a plant in Gujarat in 2021,” Mr Jagani concluded. www.fillenpac.com Tour Sponsors: Wide-mouth preforms produced on Ferromatik Milacron equipment Short-neck preform production with (f.r.t.l.) Harshit Vankani, Kay Barton and Fillenpac staff