As the world continues to grapple with climate change, and the myriad ways to reduce carbon emissions, eco-friendly packaging companies are making sustainable strides through a variety of innovative methods.
Sweden’s Ecolean, for example, was built with a clear vision of transforming the entire packaging industry towards a lighter approach. Ecolean’s concept of using a minimal amount of raw material to create a super-thin plastic for liquid foods that weighs half as much as competitors' packaging was a game-changer. Business Bags
“And this is still what sets us apart today, that we have found a way to save nature’s resources while ensuring the highest possible food safety and differentiation effects for our customers,” said Marie Samuelsson, CEO of Ecolean Group. “Ultimately, we help reduce their carbon footprint as well as our own by producing lightweight packages that only require 50 percent of resources compared to other packaging formats for liquid food.”
Ecolean’s lighter approach is prominent throughout its packaging system, a customer-focused efficiency aimed at simplifying production. Ecolean’s filling lines that are used to fill their packages with food product, helps reduce the daily load of line operators. Also unique in the packaging industry is Ecolean’s hermetically sealed, pre-sterilized, ready-to-fill packages, which greatly simplifies operations and lowers environmental impact for their customers.
Packaging regulations, such as the EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive, will have a great impact on the global packaging industry once it is clearly established—and not only within EU market. Most packaging system suppliers operate with a multi-market approach and are affected as global free trade becomes more polarized and restricted.
“Dependencies on supply chain efficiency has never been more important and as recycling is building in importance for the future of packaging,” said Samuelsson. “We welcome these regulations and legislations as they will ensure more universal, sustainable development for packaging.”
Asia remains a key component of Ecolean’s growth strategy. The company has been present in China and many more Asian markets since day one. Its packaging material production plant was opened in 2001 in TEDA, Tianjin and since then Ecolean has retained solid market presence and consumer recognition.
“Our core markets are China and Vietnam, and they hold potential for future profitable growth, so we are focusing our efforts on these markets going forward,” said Samuelsson. “In Asia, we can also see large consumer acceptance to a diversity of packaging formats compared to for example Europe. Insight from recent studies show that our packages are considered modern, premium and sustainable in the eyes of consumers in China and Vietnam.”
Ecolean’s profitable growth journey requires the company to streamline all processes and secure IT systems in new, more established ways than they have before. By switching to the cloud-based business system SAP S/4HANA Cloud, Ecolean believes its digitization strategy and business is future proofed. With an eye towards going fully live in May 2024, all parts of the company will work with new processes based on SAP's long industry experience, helping employees boost customer relationships across service and sales, via mobile devices.
“We live in a constantly changing world with new regulations and SAP has the resources and the global reach needed,” said Anders Diurlin, IT manager at Ecolean. “Now we get a flexible solution that we can grow with during our continued automation journey.”
Ecolean believes packaging industry growth needs to come through sustainable packaging. While future legislation will help, consumers who demand recyclable packaging and more sustainable options will be a greater catalyst.
“Being on top of our game, both operationally and strategically, will be crucial in the coming years as we develop and seek profitable growth,” said Samuelsson. “We are confident that SAP will support our developments from those aspects as well.”
Brian Mortimer, Head of New Business Sales - UK Mid-Market at SAP\n
\nBrian leads an applications sales team at SAP who help mid-sized UK businesses digitally transform and realise their potential with SAP’s intelligent enterprise.
I am the Communications Director of SAP Global Communications.
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Brian Mortimer, Head of New Business Sales - UK Mid-Market at SAP\n
\nBrian leads an applications sales team at SAP who help mid-sized UK businesses digitally transform and realise their potential with SAP’s intelligent enterprise.
Brian Mortimer, Head of New Business Sales - UK Mid-Market at SAP\n
\nBrian leads an applications sales team at SAP who help mid-sized UK businesses digitally transform and realise their potential with SAP’s intelligent enterprise.
Koray Köse is a supply chain expert, tech futurist, author, former Gartner analyst, and now Chief Industry Officer at Everstream Analytics. Read Koray Köse's full executive profile here.
Brendan Howe, CEO, Techify. Read Brendan Howe's full executive profile here.
Custom Bag Tech veteran and cofounder and CEO of RevLifter, helping e-commerce retailers grow through personalized offers. Read Simon Bird's full executive profile here.