In conversation with Erhardt+Leimer

Erhardt+Leimer (E+L) provides system solutions and automation technology for running webs and belts with control, guiding, and inspection systems for the textile, paper, corrugating, film, tyre, rubber, non-woven, and printing industries. Its product range comprises customised solutions for web control, web guiding and spreading, web tension measurement and control, cutting technology, measuring and inspection technology, and print image monitoring.

E+L offers drives, sensor technology, and additional system components for the converting industry. It has certifications from UL, STO, and OPCUA. The company’s focus is on optimisation in the paper industry. Its products cover all the control and measurement challenges in web control and fabric tension in production. In the plastics space, E+L is involved in the extrusion of blown or cast films, which place extremely high requirements on production systems.

AR: What are your manufacturing plans for India? And what are your future plans for India?
Dr Michael Proeller (MP): I've been travelling to India for the last 25 years. We have an ISO-certified plant in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. Here, we employ approximately 300 people. We just opened up an education centre for young people where we educate our young workers in terms of the quality that E+L has to deliver. 

I'm very positive about our operations in India. There will be two channels of growth. One is the booming Indian market in the segments we cater to. And two, outsourcing E+L products from Europe to India, and from India to the world. I'm very positive about the E+L India operation.

AR: What do you think are the challenges faced by Indian printers and packagers as of today, and how does E+L solve some of them?
MP: For many years, business has been good. One challenge is the cost because India is a competitive price market in comparison to other markets.

Dr Michael Proeller, CEO, E+L Group

ID Singh (IDS): Our OEMs are competitive when it comes to the price. So, if somebody is seeking low-end machines, medium-segment machines, or high-end machines, they are available. We also have OEMs that are competing with European, Chinese, and Taiwanese manufacturers. 

So far, Chinese equipment manufacturers have not been able to make inroads into flexible packaging. 

AR: What about the label industry?
IDS: If you look at the label industry, they have made a dent. Of course, we have some printers and some machine manufacturers. For instance, at Labelexpo, you will see that there are three or four OEMs from India like Multitec and Alliance. 

AR: How do you provide tech support to Indian consumers of your corona treatment solutions?
IDS: E+L India has a manufacturing license from Softal to produce equipment under their brand name. We have been their partner for the last 30 years. For Corona treatments, we have our technical team which handles the challenges. 

With years of experience, we are producing Corona treatment in India, up to 15 kilowatts. We are also supporting Softal’s parent company in Germany, called AFS. AFS supplies their equipment on W&H and Reifenhauser machines. 

ID Singh, managing director, E+L India

AR: Now, of course, the global North is operating at Industry 5.0. If we are being realistic, India is lagging behind. How is E+L filling that gap?
Seshadri Rajaram (SR): Ever since Industry 4.0 became the buzzword, I concluded that Industry 4.0 is good. For a discrete manufacturing industry, Industry 4.0 is not so beneficial. I've talked to so many consultants and they agreed that it's difficult. They are interested in selling their data space and monetising it. 

But we have new generation products that are web-enabled. They can be serviced and problems can be diagnosed remotely. These serve, to some extent, the Industry 4.0 requirements of our customers.

Seshadri Rajaram, Chairman, E+L India

Thomas Grimm (TG): When you see the applications and when you talk to our customers, then they are interested in using the data from our systems and comparing it with data they have on the machine. That helps them to become more efficient.

Thomas Grimm, sales division manager and business executive, Asia Pacific, E+L

AR: Now, I want to come specifically to the various segments that you cater to. First is, of course, paper. It is a very capital-intensive and energy-intensive industry. Are there any problem areas that you have identified there? What are your paper industry-specific solutions? Can you talk a little bit about that?
MP: If you ever have seen a paper machine, you know what a monster it is. It has to run 365 days, 24-7. We provide very sophisticated products for the paper machine, which are guides and tension controllers.

You have felts where the paper is on and these felts are running at speeds of 200-kilometres per hour. Our guides are guiding these felts. 

We also build stretchers. The dehydration process of the material is essential for paper manufacturing. So you have to stretch these felts in order to have permeability to extract the water out of the material. This is the high art of guiding and stretching. 

AR: In terms of plastic, can you elaborate on how E+L plays into that space?
MP: In plastics, it's a little bit different than in paper. We are not in granulates. We start entering the plastics process when it comes to extrusion. There, we are present with our guiding systems and then the plastic is printed where we operate our corona treaters. 

Then it's folded where we are with our web guides with our tension controls. We accompany the plastic packaging or flexible packaging material process from the extrusion to the finished product. 

AR: What role do you see artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning play in the print and packaging industries?
MP: AI plays an important role in E+L’s business model in two directions. One, in the development of sensors a sensor is a classic item where AI can be used. 

It detects repetitive defects, it's predictive, and the customer can derive a lot of usage from it. For example, for the textile industry, we developed a sensor which uses some Nvidia chips and AI that predicts if a seam is coming through the machine, it detects exactly how thick the seam is, and where the seam has to be — because it has millions and millions of examples from other camera detections in his database. AI is nothing but a mathematical algorithm.

We make use of that in our products. On the other hand, any company in the world should use AI to streamline their internal processes to be more competitive. I think for any industrial company, AI can play a role.

But the biggest role AI can play is streamlining the processes, making the ERP systems more efficient, reducing inventory, and reducing inefficiency from the process. For example, how is a webshop different from AI? When Amazon started 20 years ago, it was the first “AI” because it eliminated people.

So AI plays a great role in the production and internal processes.

AR: What is the sustainability quotient at E+L?
MP: The question of sustainability is always one of eliminating material waste. If you eliminate waste, you don't have to take care of sustainability, because there's nothing to reuse. 

All of E+L’s products are sustainable, not because we are such a green company. On average, if you consider E+L’s web guide, it has been running for approximately five years, and then it breaks. In these five years, whether it guides textiles, paper, corrugating board, battery foil, or flexible films, it saves approximately 100-tonnes of material, because we guide the material directly without edge cutting into the next process.

All E+L products contribute to the carbon footprint of our customers. If we were to make a carbon balance sheet for our products, E+L saves approximately 200,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year, because all our products eliminate waste. 

SR: I'll give you a practical experience I had. When I started selling web guides about 40 years ago, I went to a newspaper and a magazine centre, and I tried to convince the manager to buy a web guide. He said, “No, no, we don't need any web guides." 

I was a little bit disappointed and I was leaving. When I saw a truckload of cutting waste, being disposed of. I went back immediately and asked him what was being transported. He said, “That is waste material.” Because for a 1,300-mm or 1,400-mm format, they were using a 1,500-mm paper. After printing, they cut off the edges, and then they are used. I said I can save you one truckload of waste. It can probably be reduced to 10%.

That is how I sold that web guide to that guy after he said no. This was 40 years ago, it was a company called Deccan Herald in Bengaluru.