KBA Rapida hits the ground running at Packages Limited

Based in Lahore, the second-largest city in Pakistan, Packages Limited was founded in 1956 as a result of a joint venture between the Pakistani Ali Group and Akerlund & Rausing from Sweden. Within the field of premium packaging the company covers the entire process chain and offers value-added products to regional and international firms. Among its customers are renowned firms, such as Unilever and Pakistan Tobacco Company which has worked with Packages Limited for over 50 years.

In May last year it celebrated the installation of a KBA Rapida 106 with six inking units, coater and delivery extension designed to allow the company to strengthen its competitiveness. Additional automation features such as FAPC automatic plate changers and CleanTronic washing systems were specified by Packages Limited, and the press was raised by 450mm to facilitate packaging production with higher piles.

The original target for Packages Limited was to print 90 jobs and a total of six million sheets per month on the new press. With typically 150 job changes, the expectations have been exceeded by far. Regular production at 18,000 sheets per hour is one factor which has contributed to the outstanding result, as has the broad spectrum of substrates which can be processed on the KBA Rapida 106.

In the year since its installation, 70 million impressions have been produced using the press, and the press has brought Packages Limited more than just the envisaged capacity expansion.

Mudassar Shafique, business unit manager for folding cartons at Packages Limited, said: ‘The KBA Rapida 106 is a very operator-friendly press, easy to handle and at the same time robust. The high print quality, right up to maximum production speed, is particularly remarkable. And over 70 million printed sheets in less than a year are even more remarkable.

‘We need fast job changes and the KBA Rapida 106 makes that so easy for us. It also ensures fast job turnarounds. Print quality and speed have been revolutionised with the KBA Rapida 106. 99.5 percent saleable production and only three percent waste are world-class performance. Those are the best quality and productivity figures which we have ever achieved.'

KBA said this performance means a second press investment by Packages Limited ‘can thus only be a question of time’, while Shafique added: ‘The investment in the KBA press has already more than paid off.’