PPOA hosts successful Adoptech conference in Pune

The International Conference Adoptech2023 was supported by the Government of India, International Cooperation Section, Ministry of MSME (Micro, Small, Medium Enterprises), New Delhi and was organised by The Poona Press Owners Association’s (PPOA) team in Pune at Hotel Lemon Tree Premier, Pune. The conference received an overwhelming response and was attended by 200 plus delegates from all over India, out of which close to 50% delegates were from cities other than Pune.

Adoptech2023  was inaugurated by Ravindra Joshi who is the president of AIFMP. In his welcome speech, Joshi briefly outlined the importance of organising such knowledge-sharing industry events and setting the tone to engage with the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. Later, Ravinder Reddy, the chairman for MSME Welfare standing committee, shared the Pack of Benefits. He highlighted the activities of the ministry and MSME department and the benefits of being part of the MSME network.

CR Janardhana, the mentor for MSME Welfare standing committee, AIFMP shared his thoughts and motivated the delegates about the importance of the MSME ministry. He said, it is time for the industry to avail the benefits of MSME and boost the economic engine of the country. Kamal Mohan Chopra, the chairman of the World Print & Communication Forum (WPCF) was invited as a special invitee for the inauguration of the event. 

(l-r) CR Janardhanan, Kamal Chopra and Ravindra Joshi

During the event, five speakers made their presentations which aligned with the theme of the International Conference. At the outset, Brian Kow, the business development manager at Prinect Solutions, Heidelberg Asia Pacific region spoke about Industry 4.0@Print. Kow highlighted the role of pre-press process and optimising the use of the printing press. This is achieved on available data regarding printing machines, its analysis and using the analysis to improve the functioning of machines, factories and overall systems while increasing the Overall Equipment Effectiveness – OEE. In real terms this translates into more printing jobs; plus 30% faster, and double productivity.

Darren Pickford, the sales director of Edale in the United Kingdom was the second speaker. His focus was sustainability and environmental care in packaging by using a single pass production philosophy. Pickford highlighted the advancement in technologies and processes which can create packaging to be produced on a single piece of equipment. His presentation looked at how automation can reduce waste, give repeatability, offer reduced touched production and advancement towards paper-based packaging while fulfilling global regulations. Edale's presses have gained currency in India because it is suitable for the production of high quality labels.

The third slot of presentation was by the material science expert, Richard Gill, product manager – sheetfed, Hubergroup from the United Kingdom. He spoke about Direct Food Contact (DFC) inks - Applications, Opportunities and Safety and Sustainability of the packaged food. Gill's touched upon the MGA Contact DFC inks and coatings which were launched in 2022. Today, he said, MGA inks are the default choice in food packaging because brand owners are looking for even more sustainable and creative packaging solutions. He enlightened the audience about direct food contact inks and coatings which he said was designed and formulated specifically for use in direct contact with food. Also it used raw materials approved for food contact and in accordance with EuPIA Good Manufacturing Process (GMP) and strict Hubergroup MGA rules. In addition, the inks were part of the special, separated production process plus the DFC coatings had functional barrier properties to protect against grease and moisture from food.

(l-r) Douglas Mooney, Richard Gill and Darren Pickford

After Gill, Mahidi from HP Indigo spoke about the future-ready digital printing solutions. Mahidi, who is a specialist in folding carton and card business, with the experience of 25 years in the offset and digital domain, has revealed the future ready digital printing solutions with the delegates in Pune. The last slot belonged to Douglas Mooney, the head of equipment - Heidelberg – Asia Pacific. Mooney is a qualified printer and worked for Heidelberg Asia Pacific as a print instructor highlighted the pain points of the print community and addressed pain points and relevant solutions from Heidelberg. He shared shopfloor secrets to boost productivity through digitalisation. He extolled the audience to focus on Overall Equipment
Effectiveness i.e OEE and systematically unlock the potential of OEE with intelligent usage.

The PPOA team encouraged interaction between the speaker and the audience, and prizes were announced for the best question from the audience.

After the presentations, it was time for a panel discussion which was moderated by Col (Hon) Professor Dr Rajendrakumar Anayath, who is the former Vice Chancellor – DCRUST University (A Haryana State Government University). The members on the panel were Ashwini Deshpande of Elephant Design, Manu Choudhury of CDC Printers, Anil Namugade of Trigon Digipack, Mumbai and Gaurav Nema of Pragati Graphics and Packaging. The two takeaways from the panel discussion was: sustainability will not happen of its accord. The industry will have to take the first step - and that small step will trigger the start of the sustainability mission. The second takeaway was quality. Everybody talks about quality every time but without any attempt being made to define quality. The panel felt, a quality standard has to be followed and standards need to be adhered to.

(clock-wise) Ravindra Joshi, Ravinder Reddy, Brian Kow and Mahidi

The panel shared their personal insights about adoption and deployment of print and finishing technologies. The panelists voiced their opinion regarding the support and expectations from the Ministry of MSME for supporting the growth of the print and packaging industry in future. And finally, the panel discussed brand requirements while benchmarking print requirements.

The closing remarks were rendered by Raghvendra Dutta Barua, HSG AIFMP and Tirthraj Joshi, vice president of PPOA thanked the speakers, delegates and media partners (which included PrintWeek and WhatPackaging? magazines). Industry veteran, Nitin Wani was the sutradhar of the conference.

As per a note shared by PPOA, "The reason for choosing the topic was very logical, based on reports from Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) that India is expected to become the fifth largest consumer market in the world due to rise in eCommerce, changing lifestyles, urbanisation and increased personal health awareness requiring print and packaging." The PPOA note added, "This will attract more investments in India through domestic investors and FDIs. As a result, it will lead to the growth of the Indian print and  packaging market. Thus making it mandatory to deploy newer technologies aligning with global trends of managing hygiene or no touch production, JIT deliveries, viable costs for short runs, supply chain issues, time to market, sustainability and eco-friendliness while supporting the transformations and disruptions in print and packaging products. Toughest of the challenges being - Fast turnaround, last mile deliveries and lowest price while portraying high end and luxurious finished product.

 Takeaways from the panel discussion: Need for sustainability and quality

The PPOA note concluded, "As they say, every challenge brings in an opportunity. The AIFMP team envisaged the challenges for the Indian print and packaging companies going forward and made the efforts to bring-in international expertise from different domains on one single mega platform. The efforts of the AIFMP team were successful as the expert speaker’s highlighted the opportunities and  developments emerging in global markets, effect of globalisation on print markets, emerging value-add applications, showcasing design differentiations, progress being made on regulations, sustainability, IOT - connected factories and supply chain automation, AI - machine efficiency and workflow optimisation, robotics in print manufacturing and automation and other emerging technologies.