The new Made in Piacenza machines are called “Triplex one shot”, which allow the energy costs of producing flexible packaging to be reduced by 80% and are driving Nordmeccanica’s order book. In a phase, such as the current one, of quotations for gas and oil and bills that have become the real distinction of the sustainability and competitiveness of companies, the new technologies of the Piacenza group are experiencing a real boom: with orders for January the world leader in machinery to produce multilayer bags for packaged food, plastic packaging and pharmaceutical blisters – 110 million euros in turnover, 95% export, and 300 direct employees among the five plants, of which three in Piacenza, one in China and one in the US – it has already secured 70% of last year’s revenues.
New orders
“And new orders continue to arrive every day”, underlines Vincenzo Cerciello, technical director of Nordmeccanica, second generation at the helm of the pocket multinational, which has already prepared for the increase in activity by building a new warehouse in Piacenza of 3 thousand square meters where, 30 people will be hired from next summer. What is worrying is not the demand, but the ability to meet supply-side commitments. «The conflict between Russia and Ukraine has no direct impact on our sales, because they are marginal markets that are worth a few percentage points of our exports, but it aggravates an already difficult context for the procurement of raw materials and aggravates the price increases already underway.
Russia is a supplier of iron, aluminum and manufactured goods
Russia – explains Cerciello – is one of the most important suppliers of iron, aluminum and manufactured goods for the mechanical industry, which we and our competitors will now compete with on other channels. Fortunately, already last year, at the first signs of tensions on international markets, we increased our inventories and so far we have never delayed the delivery of a plant “. it undermines the optimism on the 2022 results and does not slow down the new research and development projects, to which Nordmeccanica dedicates at least 5% of its turnover every year, “because only continuous innovation allows us to remain world leaders in the sector”, remarks the director technical, recalling that the new “Nordmeccanica Triplex one shot” is also the result of frontier work done in collaboration with Dow Chemical.
The three factors of energy saving
«There are three factors that allow the new machines to drastically cut costs: high digitization, which optimizes the workflow through data analysis, memorization of operational settings and remote control; the integration of different processes on a single device, which can do more things more efficiently; and, third, the reduction of production times, in the order of 50% », concludes Cerciello.