Kiefel announced its Customer Innovation Centre Polymer is nearing completion. The Germany-based packaging machinery manufacturer celebrates its 70th anniversary this year and is marking the occasion with investments in technology, management, and customer support.
The new polymer Customer Innovation Centre (CIC), located at Kiefel’s headquarters in Freilassing, is set to enhance the company’s capabilities in packaging solutions. Scheduled for completion in the second quarter of 2025, the centre offers customers access to new machinery and laboratory facilities to support product development and optimisation.
The centre features Kiefel’s latest series machines for tool and product sampling, as well as customer-oriented prototyping. Advanced laboratory services, including microscopic examinations, material and layer thickness measurements, and statistical analyses, provide critical support for innovation.
“We have stood for technological excellence for 70 years – by investing in another CIC, we are creating a first-class development environment, enabling us to bring innovations to market even faster,” said Matt Sieverding, CEO of Kiefel since last September.
Kiefel is also reinforcing its leadership team, appointing three new heads of division to drive strategic growth. Sven Engelmann, vice president technology, will oversee technological advancements and the polymer innovation centre; Bengt Schmidt, vice president packaging, will lead the strategic development of the packaging division and global sales expansion; and Bernd Stein, vice president engineering, will focus on streamlining development processes and optimising machine and tool solutions.
“With these reinforcements in our management team, we have gained very experienced players from the packaging and plastics industry with whom we can grow,” Sieverding added. “The implemented investments and various strategic decisions made as part of our ‘One Kiefel’ future strategy are already showing success on the market, which is reflected by our order intake.”
The ‘One Kiefel’ strategy aims to increase the company’s innovative capacity and increased proximity to customers in relevant markets. Last November, Kiefel announced job cuts in Germany and closure of a site in Austria as a consequence of the strategy.
Latest machine solutions
Kiefel’s newest machine solutions, showcased at the Packaging Dialogue Days in late 2024, have been met with strong demand, the company said in a statement. The company’s NATUREFORMER KFT 90.1, designed for natural fibre packaging, has been successfully installed at multiple customer sites in France, demonstrating its efficiency in sustainable packaging production. Additionally, the KTR 6.2 tilting machine, known for its enhanced performance, has already been deployed at several customer locations.
Kiefel plans to present these and other innovations at the K 2025 in Düsseldorf this October.