Made in India - Amritsar

A prominent feature of the industrial scenario of Punjab is its small sized industrial units. There are nearly 194,000 small scale industrial units in the state in addition to 586 large and medium units. The Printweek India team visited the golden city of Amritsar on a three-day tour. The report is an extract of the team’s interaction with seven key manufacturers in Amritsar’s print and packaging segment, and what one can expect from them at PrintPack 2015 show.

15 Dec 2014 | By PrintWeek India

HIC Machinery

About
HIC Machinery is one of the leading manufacturers producing automatic plants for 3-ply and 5-ply corrugated boards. Having an in-house setup from casting to final test and trial, which includes an in-house R&D setup, the company has dedicated its two decades of inception into betterment of the corrugation industry.
HIC also represents Italian corrugation machinery manufacturer Agnati. HIC has recently installed an Agnati machine in South India Paper Mill. The manufacturing capacity of HIC includes three plants of semi-automatic corrugation machinery every month and 4-5 automatic plants in a year.

Installations
Installations of 50 automatic plants. Total of around 150 automatic plants in India.

Product portfolio
3-ply, 5-ply and 7-ply  semi-automatic and automatic plants along with flexo printer, die punching, fingerless machine, roll to sheet cutter, reel stand, automatic print slotters etc.

Products at Printpack ‘15
HIC will showcase automatic and semi-automatic lines. It would be focussing on fingerless machines and the NC cutters for reel-to-sheet cutting. These two machines are ideal for a printers who are planning to diversify into packaging.

Policy initiatives

According to Khushsinder Singh Sandhu, managing partner at HIC (in pic above), corrugation market in India is growing but is also challenged by the Chinese markets. “This can be curbed very well if government improvises on offering better incentives to the foreign manufacturers. Also, there should be extra duty on import of Chinese machines. European manufacturers like Agnati prefer to set-up their facilities in China because the government there offers affordable infrastructure facilities. Our government also have similar policies. In terms of taxation, GST should be introduced as soon as possible so that we get time to put our minds on manufacturing and not on handling accounts.
 

Five Star Printing machinery



About
Five Star Machinery, the Amritsar-based printing and packaging machinery manufacturer, was established in 1981 and is headed by the father-son duo of KS Khurana and NS Khurana. Since its inception the company has been engaged in manufacturing of machinery for binders, printers and packaging industry.

Product portfolio
Saddle stitchers, creasers, round-cornering, glue applicators, paper cutting machines, semi-automatic die-cutting machine with hot-foil attachment, three-hole drilling machine; spiral binding machine; double-wire binding machine; semi-automatic six head saddle-stitching machine and exercise book binding and folding machine

Products at PrintPack ‘15
The company plans to target stationery market. The company will introduce several new products for this segment. This includes automatic punching machines for spiral and wiro binding jobs, which is capable of punchng over 40,000 pages in an hour.

Policy Initiatives

According to the Khuranas, there are government policies for new players to set-up a new plant, however, the existing facilities are not encouraged for expansion or policies under which companies can collaborate. For industries to grow, inspite of allocating plots and giving subsidies to set up factories, government must form clusters and provide ready factories equipped with power and water supply. This would  accelerate manufacturing. In current scenario, acquiring land and  getting permissions is a year long process.

Indo Poly Machines Corporation
 

About
Indo Poly Machines, headed by T R Mahajan and his son Gaurav Mahajan (in the pic above) is an ISO 9001:2008 certified company which caters to manufacturing of paper-cutting knives for Indian as well as imported paper-cutting machines and three- knife trimmers, under the brand name of Poly-Master. Their main customer base is paper- cutting machine manufacturers, printers and also suppliers. Poly-Master cutting knives are made of carbide tips and very recently the company has invested in manufacturing of alloy blades.  

Indo Poly Machines currently manufactures 30,000 blades in a month. This also inclues re-grinding of blades.  They also have a capacity to manufacture two to three grinding machines in a month.

Products
Paper-cutting machine knives, automatic knife sharpening machines and automatic grinding machines.

Products at PrintPack ‘15
The company will be showcasing the grinding machines. Apart from this, Indo Poly Machines will educate the visitors on the use of alloy steel blades and its advantages over the carbide.

Guru Nanak Printing Machinery

About
Established in 1960, Guru Nanak Printing Machinery is a sister-concern of Guru Nanak Machinery, one of the oldest manufacturing set-ups in Amritsar. They are among a few manufacturers which export die-cutting machines to Europe. As of now they have only 10-15% percentage of exports but the company claims to export a fairly huge share to Europe and middle-east in the coming years. After the split recently with Guru Nanak Machinery, the company has invested in a new plant in Amritsar. Among its investments include automatic overhead cranes as a part of automation for its manufacturing process. The new facility is spread across a 2500 sq/yards site and the new project is in initial stages. The company manufactures four to five machines a month.

Star Product
Die-punching for which they have frequent orders from Europe.

Product portfolio
Platen die-punching, paper-cutting and corrugation machines.

Products at PrintPack ‘15
Platen die-punching machine and programmable paper cutting machine

Expectations from PrintPack ‘15
I hope it will be a positive outcome for us. Previous year, we definitely got new customers out of the show and I look forward to expand our clientele.

Policy initiatives

Chinese machines coming into India should be discouraged and not banned. This can be done by putting forth high import duties on such machines to make our kit competitive, says Kartar Singh of Guru Nanak Packaging. “There is one thing the government should ideally do is to honour the Indian manufacturers who are exporting to European or other countries. In countries like China, when a manufacturer gets an export order the government supports them in terms of providing free electricity, free logistics and technical know-how incase there are any difficulties. Such blend of idea should be undertaken by Indian Government as well.”
 

Guru Nanak Machinery
 


About 
An ISO-9001 certified company, Guru Nanak Machinery was established in 1962 and caters to the print packaging sectors. With an in-house R&D and quality control workshop, the company has a production capacity of up to five machines in a month. The company is managed by Sardul Singh and Amit Pal Singh both directors at the company.

Product portfolio
Automatic and semi-automatic jumbo die-punching machines for paper as well as corrugated sheets, semi-automatic and automatic programmable paper-cutting machines, box stitching machines, rotary cutting and creasing, single face paper corrugating machines, reel to sheet cutters.

Products at Printpack ‘15
The company will launch platen die-punching machine with new features like automatic scrap removal technology and auto-fed rotary sticker half-cutting machine and perforating machine.

Measures?
I would setup a cluster with the help of the Government from where all the industries can benefit with the basic amenities and needs to make a good machine. 
 
Policy initiatives
Ban on import of second hand machines especially for those which are manufactured in India. 

Tangible steps?
The manufacturers in Amritsar lack technology and know-how to produce machines. The second factor that the industry in Amritsar lacks is skilled workers.


 

Associated Engineering Corporation



About
Established in 1968 as a manufacturer of letterpress printing machines, Associated Engineering Corporation has over the years created a brand of its Sujata range of products. Vinay Kumar Gupta, CEO of the company, proudly lists its key clients: MBD, BILT, Brijwasi Printers and Srinivas Fine Arts among others. Covering over 2000 yards site in Amritsar, the company specialises in die-cutting, corrugation and paper cutting machines.

Products
Heavy duty platen die-cutting machine, creasing embossing presses with hot-foil,
reel-to-sheet cutter, single-facer corrugation machine, automatic paper guillotine, programmable paper guillotine

Products at PrintPack ‘15
The company will be showcasing the die-cutter SDC seriesand double profile single facer corrugating machine.


Policy Initiatives

Gupta says, “I believe government policies should be shaped on two fronts. One is relaxation on taxes for Indian manufacturers. Two, the excise duty limits should be extended so that we are able to compete with Chinese players. Also, there has to be an encouragement to manufacture ancillary parts. We make most of our parts ourselves so our production speed comes down.”

Kalsi machinery
 


About 
Kalsi Machinery is an ISO 9001:2008 company established in the year 1972. It has two manufacturing capacity with unit-1 comprising of 1000 sq/m and unit 2 with 400 sq/m capacity. Both capacities combined together, the company manufactures 60-70 machines a month. Its key customers include Thomson Press, Repro India, Kala Jyothi, Delhi Press etc. The company is managed by Pritam Singh Kalsi and his two sons, Parminder and Jagtar.

Product portfolio
Fully automatic and semi-automatic thread book sewing, note-book stitching machine, perfect book binding machine, automatic end sheet gluing machine, hydraulic nipping machine, edge squaring machine, creasing cum perforating machine, sticker half-cutting machine, high speed book and box cutting machinealongwith their spare parts. 

Products at PrintPack ‘15
Automatic end sheet gluing machine, edge squaring machine. the company would be launching book backing and rounding machine which is currently under R&D stages.   
 

Policy initiatives
According to Parminder, there should be a ban on the imports of Chinese machine and government should promote more of the ‘Make in India’ slogans across India. Also, the second important factor is, government should offer resources to manufacturers to manufacture machines that are not being manufactured currently in India and are being exported. Finally, the border to Pakistan should be opened for trading. This will facilate exports to Pakistan directly from Amritsar instead of going through Dubai, which adds to the duty taxes. This would very much curb the domination of Chinese machines in Pakistan. 


Sond Engineering
 


About 
Established five decades ago, Sond is being currently managed by Iqbal Singh (in the pic above). Sond is engaged in the manufacturing of Everest brand heavy duty cutting and creasing platens. Sond claims it to be the pioneers in India to develop the large size die-cutters, in jumbo series. Since the past three years Sond has been exporting its products to various countries. Everest die-cutters are itnernationally acknowledged and certified under CE standard. 

Product portfolio
Everest platen presses ranging from 36 inches to 110 inches.

Products at PrintPack ‘15
Sond will be displaying the die-cutting machines.