Herma to invest €100 million

Packaging Solutions

Herma is undertaking the largest investment in the company’s 110 year history –spending €100 million to build a further, new coating plant for self-adhesive materials in Filderstadt, Germany. This will probably be the world’s most modern production line for labellers and labelling machines. Both production facilities will be located in the area immediately adjacent to the company’s headquarters. The purchase price for that area is not included in the investment sum. In both cases, construction will begin in 2017, and commissioning is scheduled for 2019.

Herma managing directors Sven Schneller and Dr Thomas Baumgärtner says that the investment is the first stage of a master plan for the 80,000 square metre area that extends to 2040. ‘With the gradual implementation of this master plan, we have the opportunity to safeguard the company’s growth at this location for several generations,’ said Sven Schneller.

In the field of self-adhesive materials, which is currently experiencing strong growth, Herma will extend the yearly coating capacity by 50% – from currently 750 million square metres to more than 1.1 billion square metres of self-adhesive materials. ‘In the new autonomous coating plant, we will produce self-adhesive materials and prepare them according to customer requests,’ explained Dr Thomas Baumgärtner, who also heads the self-adhesive materials division. ‘With this investment, we plan to extend our lead regarding multi-layer technology. We will therefore be able to add completely new products to our portfolio. Furthermore, due to the technology used in the new plant, we will be able to grow even more in the attractive field of film based materials.’

Currently still located in Deizisau, Germany, the Labelling Machines division, which is also growing at a fast rate, will move to Filderstadt during the course of this investment. ‘We have the historically unique opportunity to build state of the art production lines for labellers and labelling machines – within an ideal building layout,’ summarised Martin Kühl, head of the Labelling Machines division.