Italian manufacturer and supplier of paint and ink Inkmaker Group has rebranded itself as IM Group.

The company, which has its headquarters in Turin, Italy, said the rebranding has been in the planning for about two years and comes as it has been evolving on many fronts – both internally, from its systems and processes, its software, the technology it uses and how it uses it, to its global teams around the world and externally.

It said that after acquiring several companies since 2019, it combined the expertise, intel, technology and hardware of all the brands under Inkmaker Group, but the rebranding allows it to better compete in the marketplace as a total solutions provider.

“The decision to rebrand Inkmaker Group as IM Group stems from the group’s Vision, which is to evolve our technology to expand in our fields and adapt, the advantages of our products, to new markets,” IM Group EMEA and Americas CEO Christophe Rizzo said.

“Since October 2019, Inkmaker has made large investments, on the acquisitions of the businesses of Rexson and Valtech, in UK; Tecnopails, in Italy; and most recently Swesa, in Germany. The driving strategy behind these acquisitions was to create a reliable complete supply chain serving predominantly, but not only, the ink, paint and coatings industry, to sustain our core businesses.

“This meant restructuring our brands into various specialities, yet to still be one strong force, hence the need to rebrand the existing Inkmaker Group brand, to have an identity of its own, as an autonomous holding brand­. This is the evolution of Inkmaker Group, which is essentially that of Inkmaker.”

Being a total solutions provider

IM Group’s strategy in being a total solutions provider is to create “areas of excellence” dedicating each of its brands to a specific expertise that come together. Each brand will still work individually with its existing clients in its own markets and when required, will share their expertise.

“This guarantees resource optimisation and high flexibility to manage projects of all sizes. This was one of the key reasons for forming the holding brand, IM Group, in the first place,” the company said.

“With the restructure of our brands, Inkmaker will focus on ink dispensing and software design; Rexson will be predominantly for paint as well as liquid ink, Vale-Tech will focus on narrow-web and paste-ink dispensing, so UV flexo ink and offset inks; Swesa mainly for; food, pharmaceutical, corrugated packaging, cosmetics and more; Teko will remain in POS Tinting and R&D Training and; Tecnopails for Filling Solutions.

“Externally, this decision makes it clearer for our clients to differentiate our brands, and their purposes. Internally, for us, we can focus our R&D attentions on developing that brand’s expertise.”

How this affects APAC

IM Group recently expanded its premises inMalaysia, to house its tinting and engineering brand, Teko together with Inkmaker.

It has revealed its intention to open an office in Thailand as well.

“We are gaining market share in Philippines. The big one of course is China, suffice to say that due to our larger premises we can now double the number of standard machines we ship monthly, from an average of 5 or 6 units to 10 units,” IM Group Asia Pacific CEO Roberto Guerra said.

“More importantly, the real added value for us, is the capability to build more complex units, which is where IM GROUP’s R&D is investing a lot of resources. Smart factory and Industry 4.0 are driving our growth and when you build complete production lines for a paint and ink company it’s important to have enough space to work in total safety.”

The company nominated Australian-based solutions provider, Novasys Group Pty Ltd, as its agent for Australia and New Zealand in the run-up to 2021.

Deloitte partnership

IM Group has also partnered with Deloitte to further evolve the way in which its products are impacting the environment.       

“IM GROUP is partnering with Deloitte to create a roadmap to reduce our eco-impact – the current resources we use and waste we create – so we too can do our part in reducing environmental pollution and to align our ethical principles for a safe work environment with those of the United Nations’ Global Compact,” IM Group president and global director of HR Valentina Cigna said.

The business has also announced that it has made a “significant investment” into its IMAESTRO and IMPRIMO software and automation division to increase the level of its technological capabilities.

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