BOBST Press Conference - June 2023

June in Mex, the annual BOBST Press Conference. Always an interesting event, where the trade press get to meet with, talk to and engage with Jean-Pascal Bobst and his senior management team.

This year, they wanted to give us lots of insight to innovations...but with Labelexpo and FEFCO around the corner, the lid stayed firmly on some of the latest innovations! There was also discussion on show participation, to which JPB explained that there will be big changes at Drupa, although he would not be led into a question of 'what will change'.

At the heart of the opening presentation, JPB talked about 2022 being a pivotal year for BOBST, as the business was taken private again, aligning the next generation of the family with the business. He was very quick to reaffirm that the strategy remains in place, the management team is the same and with sales up over 17.8% at CHF 1,841m in 2022, things are looking good.

In terms of 2023, JPB was able to give an overview for each of the industry units; overall, the trend is one of 'easing'. For Flexibles, there is a move back to pre-pandemic levels, but he feels that the EU Legislation will impact business development. For Labels, the trend is definitely easing, but orders in hand are still good. Looking at fibre-based packaging, both folding carton and corrugated board are showing very good demand, as more and more plastic packaging is being replaced by paper-based solutions.

At the core of the business is of course the strategy launched in 2022 - the BOBST Industry Vision. The Digitalization of the packaging supply chain that brings the brand owners closer to the customer with a digital workflow and PDF to TwinPDF to ensure validity of data within the supply chain. With the four pillars of Connectivity, Digitalization, Automation and Sustainability, the team at BOBST live and breathe it daily, instilling in their customers around the world of keeping equipment 'connected' via there tools and services to help keep maximum uptime.

Of course, the discussion on Sustainability was prevalent; specifically, looking at the UN Sustainable Development Goals, JPB was very clear in his view that for the world to really embrace sustainability, there will be a significant cost across the entire value and supply chain. "This is not something one company can fix, we all have to engage in discussion and share the costs accordingly."