The acquisition, which is expected to be finalised by the end of the month comes with a right to a seven year supply agreement to supply 100 per cent of BATA’s printed carton requirements in Australasia as well as in Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam. When settled, Anzpac will operate as a Hong Kong-based joint venture between New Toyo and its Malaysia-based subsidiary, Tien Wah Press Holdings.
Anzpac has been on the market for several months, with BAT looking to shed non-core businesses. Tien Wah is one of the region’s biggest cigarette packaging companies. Its extensive printing operation includes gravure and litho onto foil laminated paper and paperboard, and it prints cigarrete tipping paper. It has print sites in Malaysia, where it is one of the top five printers in the country, and in Vietnam.
Anzpac, which is a single facility operation, based in Smithfield produces cigarette packages as well as a number of products for the food industry. The facility houses gravure presses, offset presses and downstream converting equipment. Three years ago Anzpac gained wiorldwide fame when it installed the world’s biggest sheetfed press, a KBA Rapida 142, size 6 (55”) specified with eight printing units, a perfecting unit, two coating units, three drying units, a triple extended delivery drying unit and automated paper feed and delivery logistics, all adding up to a total length of more than 40 metres
The company’s operations will remain in Sydney and according to Geoff Boshell, general manager of Anzpac, it will be business as usual for the 180 staff employed by the company. While all staff will be retained, Boshell adds that he himself will now pursue other interests.
Boshell says, “BAT wanted to realise the value that was locked up in Anzpac, and we will now become a part of a company where packaging is its core business.” He adds, “I think it will be a positive for our employees as they will find more opportunities as part of a larger packaging group, which has a solid reputation in the market.”
Anzpac was established as a family owned company, Deaton & Spencer, in 1900, just before the separate colonised states became a federation. It experienced rapid growth during the 1960s and 70s as a supplier of cigarette cartons to Rothmans, and was then bought by the customer in 1986. A new greenfield site was established in 1992, and with it came new gravure presses and a 50” sheetfed litho press. In 1999 the merger of Rothmans and BAT resulted in Anzpac becoming the regional printing and packaging arm of BAT Australasia.
Anzpac produces work for BAT’s four Australasian regions – Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guineau and the South Pacific – but is also printing for a growing number of non-group customers, including McDonalds, Colgate and Mars, with the outside work now accounting for 35 per cent of throughput. Some 20 per cent of its work is exported. It is one of only two gravure and litho packaging plants in Australia, and has 180 staff producing packaging 24 hours a day.
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