NEWS AND ARTICLES

On Sept. 11,  Jimmy Co, of Topbest, together with his wife, Geraldine, son, John, brother, Joaquin, Tom Carunungan, of Nitto Printing and Ivy Tamisin of HP, set out to visit the foremost flexible packaging converter, Seikou Co., Ltd. for a private plant tour of their Tsukuba factory. We were hosted and personally guided by their very gracious Vice President/Executive Director, Masaki Hayashi-San. He was joined by Mac-San, the Israel-based designer and father of the HP Indigo 20000, who flew in to Tokyo just to accompany us.

The 104 year-old (founded 1911), fourth generation, family-owned company, is the leading film processing manufacturer specialized in agricultural wrapping and packaging products in Japan.

Their three major lines of business are film processing, package materials for agricultural products, and digital printing.

Seikou supplies environment-friendly packing materials and works on a “5S” principle: (1) Safety and Security  (2) Speed  (3) Smile  (4) Simplicity, and (5) Steadiness.

The company has a 25% share of the wrapping and packaging materials market for fruit and vegetables in Japan. They have eight offices spread throughout the country. In their three factories in Miyagi, Tsukuba, and Kochi, they process a wide variety of films such as rectangular or triangular packs, self-standing packs and specially-formed packs exactly suited for each agricultural product.

The company is continually actively researching and developing everyday how to keep fresh produce fresher for longer.

They have their own state-of-the-art production facilities for manufacturing and printing packs, thereby providing the total solution from research and development, design, material procurement, production, quality inspection, storage, custody logistics, right up to sales.

In their printing plant in Ibaraki Prefecture, named Tsukuba 2025, for their vision of the company, Seikou has integrated two of the very latest HP Indigo 20000 digital presses and one Indigo WS6600 to complement their gravure presses, in their immaculately-clean, cutting-edge facilities. Their environment initiatives far, far exceed the most stringent Japanese compliance regulations.

The HP Indigo 20000 Digital press is the right solution for this market, says Masaki-San. “We’re impressed by HP’s consideration of food packaging safety regulations, since more than half of the products in the flexible packaging industry go to packaging food. As converters we take full responsibility for our products. HP provides the necessary conformity to enable us to print safely. It means we fully comply with any regulations we meet.”

“The abilities of the HP Indigo presses allow Seikou to offer a flexible and competitive service. One of the strengths of HP Indigo is that we can manage variable data printing. This allowed us to fulfill a new print run for one of our big clients - confectionery manufacturer, Colombin, that had a huge impact. The package has several tens of thousands of varieties, every individual package was unique.”

Seikou used the HP SmartStream Mosaic automated design capabilities of the HP Indigo 20000 to create this innovative packaging run for Colombin.

“Thanks to the HP Indigo, we at Seikou continue to take on customer challenges.” says Masaki Hayashi.  “When customers present various problems, we’re happy that we can now provide solutions.”

Seikou, in English could mean affection, it could also mean exquisite, and it could also mean success. From Masaki-San’s passion, pride and love for what he does, the flawless, impeccable quality of his products, and his accomplishments, vision and continuing success, all three are appropriate meanings for their company.

Domo arigato gozaimashita for your very kind hospitality, Masaki-San. Jimmy-San and Tom-San are truly grateful and honored that you welcomed us into your very impressive plant. You are truly Japan’s flexible packaging Champion! We wish more success to your Company!