In September 2013, at the time of Labelexpo Europe, we published an article based on IppStar’s mini-survey of the Indian label industry. We were able to say at the time that the decline in the installs of the imported or high-end narrow web flexo presses could be as high as 40% in the 2013-14 financial year. It seems that our pessimistic forecast has been validated with the number of high-end press installs declining by about 36% over the 2012-13 financial year.
“In this category, Gallus had its most successful year ever in India while Mark Andy, Nilpeter, Gidue and Omet had an ordinary year in terms of number of machines installed. However, the complexity and cost of the top-end machines of all manufacturers did indeed increase in the past year and thus the net $ or ` value (although difficult to estimate) was not much lower than the previous year. Overall, there is a continued trend for increased automation and more highly configured presses particularly amongst the established label printers. Our forecast for Multitec Aids, the leading Indian manufacturer of label presses, has been proven slightly optimistic in terms of installs in India which are a couple of machines less than we had calculated. However, Multitec’s four installs outside India were above our forecast and these represent a significant factor going forward. Multitec made breakthroughs in the past year with leading Indian label printers and has won its fastest repeat order from one of them. Its servo-based UV press has stabilized in terms of quality and reliability and is expected to break fresh ground this year with exports of complex cons to developed countries.”
2014-15 expectations
There is a great deal of optimism in the label industry for a bounce back. The econ- omy in terms of GDP is predicted to grow at perhaps 6.5% and the Indian Rupee has already strengthened to 60 versus the US$ – an improvement of 12% from its lowest level eight months ago in end-August 2013. Every manufacturer and dis- tributor we have spoken to is optimistic and each one speaks about the continued improvement in the complexity, automation features and value of the presses that are being purchased.
For many leading label printers, investment is a compulsion in order to improve their efficiencies. However, in a year where margins were squeezed by the rise in inputs including substrates, they also needed to invest in high value presses in or- der to maintain their market positioning. There is considerable, and one might say, renewed interest in producing shrink sleeves on narrow web label presses and also some talk of in-mould labels. Multi-layer labels and booklet labels also con- tinue to be interesting specializations.
From our point of view, the big story of the past year is that of Indian label printers setting up plants in other countries. Ajanta Packaging has done this in the Middle East and also in Thailand, while Manipal and Positive Packaging have in- vested in plants in Africa. Multi-location expansion and the ability to compete in the global market whether by direct exports or by setting up overseas projects is the single most dynamic and important feature of the Indian packaging industry as a whole.
