While the financial details of the deal remain undisclosed, the transaction is expected to be completed soon, pending regulatory approvals.

Alexander Baumgartner, CEO, Constantia Flexibles, said, “Through this acquisition, we will become the third largest flexible packaging company in India, which is the fastest growing packaging market globally with double-digit growth rates driven by the megatrend urbanisation and the expansion of the retail sector.”

Established in 1986, Creative Polypack is India’s fourth largest flexible packaging group involved in manufacturing film-based flexible packaging for the food and home and personal care industries, as well as paper-based soap wrappers.

It is expected to achieve sales of about 75 million EUR in the business year 2017-2018 and currently has about 850 employees at eight production sites in Baddi, Kanpur, Kolkata, Assam and Puducherry, across India.

According to Constantia, Creative’s senior management will remain in their current roles.

Baumgartner added, “With this move we gain a stronger footprint in the home and personal care market, which complements our existing customer portfolio, while we are now able to cover the whole of the Indian subcontinent with our extensive production footprint.”

Constantia Flexibles already has a stronghold in the film-based flexible packaging for the Indian market since acquiring Ahmedabad-based Parikh Packaging in 2013. Parikh Packaging has been part of Constantia Flexibles since 2013 and has a production unit in Ahmedabad, including rotogravure printing machines, PE extruders, various lamination technologies and pouch making. It is a fully ISO-certified and serves with more than 500 qualified employees the domestic and global food and HPC markets.

During PlastIndia in February, the company announced an investment of Rs 100-crore in a new greenfield site, which will be home to a polyethylene blown film extruder, high-definition flexo printing press and laminators that will produce high barrier laminates that can be fully recycled. The extra capacity will go live in 2019.

Constantia Flexibles is the world’s fourth largest producer of flexible packaging. It employs 7,200 people across 32 sites in 18 countries.