Of the 140 machines that the company has installed across India, about 11 have been sold to packaging converters in Surat, who produce saree boxes.

“Majority of the Surat installations are less than two years old,” said Jitendra Patel of Excel Machinery.

The top names include Suryansh Pratham, Sachin Corrugators, Jain Offset, Ansapack, and Madhav Printers among others.

Saree box printers in Surat have always relied on manually-operated platen punching machines. However, labour scarcity and higher wage levels coupled with increasing competition have compelled print firms in Surat to invest in automation.
Suryansh Pratham, established in 2002 as a canvasser, invested in a printing and converting set-up in 2007. Over the years, the company bolstered its post-press adding up to ten manual punching machines.

Tanmay Agarwal of Suryansh, said, “We could replace eight manual machines with two Maxima die-cutters. That’s when I realised that I should have gone for it about three years ago. It’s well suited for Surat market where the jobs are short-run.”
Agarwal recommended Maxima for packaging jobs up to one lakh sheets.

Besides Suryansh, Jain Offset and Sachin Corrugators placed orders for two Maxima machines in 2015, the latest machine was commissioned in the last quarter of 2016.

Mukesh Jain of Jain Offset, which was presented Special Jury Award in packaging category at PrintWeek Awards 2016 for its micro-embossed saree boxes, was impressed with the cost-feature proposition that Maxima offers.

“The machine comes with a zero gripper system which is useful for punching large sized cartons especially for saree boxes,” Generally, 7-13mm space is reserved for gripper margins, which ultimately goes into wastage. The grippers which disturb the punching can be removed and the gripper margins can be utilised as flaps. “It helps in reducing wastage caused due to gripper allowances.”

Manjeet Dhariwal of Sachin Corrugators, said, “The job changeover takes only 15 minutes. Plus the non-stop feeder adds to the productivity.”

A new packaging set-up in Surat, Madhav Printers, which specialises in producing PP cartons invested in Excel Maxima to die-punch PP sheets.

The majority of the boxes produced in Surat are telescopic cartons which are die-cut and then are manually folded at the customer end. While European machines are too expensive for such a market, Excel Maxima becomes a perfect fit in terms of ROI as well as all the necessary automation and productivity benefits.