Manroland Goss boosts packaging offer with Thallo buy

Manroland Goss Group is the worldwide business of Manroland Goss Web Systems (MGWS).

Thallo web presses are targeted at runs that are too short to be profitable using flexo or gravure, but “too long to be economically viable on digital”.

Its offset printing unit can run in wet offset, dry offset, ‘rainbow’ print and UV flexo mode. Hybrid offset configurations are also possible, combining other print processes.

Target markets included the production of high-quality film, foil, paper- and board-based labels and packaging, as well as security print applications.

Web widths range from 520mm to 1,050mm and the presses run at up to 400m/min.

Manroland Goss chief executive Franz Kriechbaum said the buy would complete the firm’s packaging portfolio alongside its Varioman web offset presses for various packaging applications.

“Next to the fully automated and highly flexible Varioman packaging solution, the Thallo press will strengthen our footprint in the packaging growth market,” he stated.

Manroland Goss also plans to collaborate with partner firm DG Press Services on manufacturing and project management of the Thallo presses.

“Manroland Goss is taking the future in packaging very seriously and see web offset as the answer to environmental pressure on gravure and the need of shorter runs, which leads to a good and solid ROI for customers comparing offset with flexo and gravure technology,” added Theo Buchmeyer, MGWS vice president for business development and product management.

There are seven Thallo presses currently running worldwide, of which six are in Europe.

Contiweb had been a subsidiary of Goss, but following Goss’s merger with Manroland in 2018, the then-owner of Goss AIP spun out Contiweb as a standalone, independent business.

Contiweb was acquired by H2 Equity in the autumn of 2019.

Rutger Janssen, chief executive of Contiweb, and Sander Koster, investment director at H2 Equity Partners, said that Manroland Goss represented the type of “best owner” for the Thallo operation. “Solid, global, and well positioned in the web-offset market.”

Contiweb will focus on its core business of auxiliary systems, including splicers and dryers.

The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

MGWS is part of the Lübeck, Germany-based Possehl Group, together with American Industrial Partners.

The firm will install the first cartonboard version of its Varioman packaging web offset press at a greenfield site next year.