around the globe

01/2017

SANIA GOES WITH SIPA FOR BIG STACKABLES IN IVORY COAST

The largest refiner of palm oil on the African continent has chosen SIPA equipment for production of large stackable PET containers.
Sania CIE, headquartered in the Ivory Coast capital, Abidjan, is now making preforms on an XFORM 500 injection molding system running with a 16-cavity mold, and then blowing them into containers with volumes of 20 and 25 liters on an SFL 2/2 linear stretch-blow molding unit. It is producing up to 800 containers every hour, which it then fills with the edible oil.
The PET containers weigh something like 60% less than the containers of the same volume that Sania had been producing in high density polyethylene. With HDPE and PET prices currently around the same level, Sania is making considerable cost savings in materials.

Sania is now also much more efficient in terms of machine usage. Whereas one SFL 2/2 is all that is needed to blow sufficient PET containers, it would could require up to as many as no fewer than eight extrusion-blow molding machines to provide the same output in HDPE. This clearly provides significant advantages in terms of space needed for the equipment, running cost (energy, air, consumables), maintenance costs and labor.

SIPA has provided Sania with an XFORM500/16 that has customized End-Of-Arm Tooling (EOAT) capable of handling the long, wide-mouthed preforms needed for the 20L and 25L bottles. The cooling robot has also been designed to allow a gentle release of the preforms onto the transport belt without causing any damage, either to the preforms or the belt.
Sania chose SIPA for the new installation, not only for the inherent high performance of its equipment—in terms of output quality and quantity—but also because SIPA was able to supply a complete packaging solution for the design and production of the preforms and bottles, and also molds for the handles and closures. “This makes our turnkey solution highly cost-competitive,” says Giovanni De Rosa, SIPA’s sales manager for Central and Southern Africa. “It’s a winning packaging solution!”

About Sania: Sania is a joint venture between Wilmar International, Asia’s leading agribusiness group, and SIFCA Holding, a major specialist in the agricultural industry in Ivory Coast and neighboring countries. It is a leader in the production of refined palm oil products - olein, stearin, palm fatty acid distillate and margarine - with the largest palm oil refining plant in Africa (daily output is 1,500 tonnes).
Download .pdf: