Fero has facilities in Letchworth and Sandy and is part of the £77m-turnover Writtle group of businesses.

The company installed the new Packline SA device at its Sandy site earlier this year.

It automates a process typically handled manually by outworkers, by using hot melt glue to seal corrugated FEFCO 401/2 packs up to 50mm thick.

Neil Thayer, owner at UK and Ireland agent Finishline Machinery, said that Lamina had wanted to build a machine with this functionality for some time, and the development involved Garry Woods, operations director at Fero Sandy, and Lamina System design manager Jesper Hjalmarsson bringing their combined expertise to the project.

“The main USP is due to its genius of design and construction, there is no need for any set-ups, meaning different sizes and capacity of collated packs can be hand-fed continuously without stopping,” Thayer explained.

“It doesn’t matter what size it is, the machine will sense the pack size, fold it, and apply the glue immediately.”

Fero is a B-Corp, and Thayer said the line also had environmental benefits as it does away with the need to use vinyl tapes.

“Branded vinyl tape is expensive and of course it’s a plastic in terms of recycling,” he added.

Inkjet printheads can also be added to the line to provide branding and information on the pack contents, and this is something Fero is currently in the process of deciding upon.

Thayer described the machine as “revolutionary” with the potential to disrupt print finishing. Typical ROI is estimated at 12-18 months.

“The Packline SA was built for flat corrugated packs of POS work, however it could easily be used in other industries where this kind of corrugated packing is required.”

The Lamina Packline SA will have its worldwide public debut at the upcoming Drupa show which starts at the end of May. Pricing details depend on size and configuration and will be disclosed at the show.