NEWS


Coveris to sell rigids business


Coveris Holdings is in exclusive negotiations with funds advised by Lindsay Goldberg to sell its Global Rigid plastic packaging business for €700m, subject to regulatory approvals. This business had sales of €560m last year. This follows on from the sale of the company’s Americas business. If the deal is complet-


ed, Coveris will be focused completely on the flexible packaging market. It claims to be one of the largest players in the world in this field, with about €800m sales from 25 facilities in five countries, employing over 3,800 people. No date has been given for the anticipated closure of the sale. � www.coveris.com


Euromap 77 interface standard is released


Euromap, the European association for plastics and rubber machinery manufac- turers, has released Euromap 77. This is the first OPC unified architecture (UA)- based digital interface for the connection of plastics and rubber injection moulding machines to central comput- ers and manufacturing execution systems (MES). Euromap 77 was on show during NPE 2018 in Orlan- do, US, this month, where machinery manufacturers promoted the advantages of standardised interfaces for users. Prototypes were made available earlier in 2018 after being showcased during K 2016 and two ‘plugfests’ by companies involved in its development in January and April. It can now be down- loaded at no cost from the Euromap website. According to the associa-


tion, Euromap 77 improves on its predecessor, Euromap 63, and “extends the functionality with additional information and interaction possibilities”, thus paving the way for Industry 4.0. Using it, machines from different manufacturers can be connected in one network for monitoring and production data acquisition, managing jobs and transfer- ring whole datasets for machine settings. The system was devel- oped by industry experts, working with the OPC Foundation and Ascolab. The injection moulding machine manufacturers involved were Arburg, Engel Austria, Fanuc Germany, Ferromatik


Milacron, KraussMaffei, Negri Bossi, Netstal, Sumitomo (SHI) Demag and Wittmann Battenfeld. Also participating were three controller manufacturers, ten MES suppliers and one user, Lego. Participants said that the digital connectivity of machines and components that Industry 4.0 represents is an essential element of increasing production efficiency. Standardised interfaces are key as machines from different suppliers can be connected to each other. “Without a common language across all partici- pants in the supply chain, we will not be able to master the complexity the Internet of Things brings,” said Dr Gerhard Dimmler, head of R&D products at Engel Austria. � www.euromap.org


Steilemann steps up to Covestro CEO


Covestro said Dr Markus Steilemann will take over the role of CEO on 1 June. He follows Patrick Thomas, who retires three months before his contract was due to end. Thomas had been


Covestro CEO since 2007, covering the company’s transition to independence from Bayer in 2015. He also served in senior roles at CEFIC and the World Plastics Council, and as president of PlasticsEurope from 2011 to 2017. Covestro supervisory


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board chairman Dr Richard Pott said Thomas “has significantly contributed to Covestro’s remarkable


success story”. Since 2015, he said, the firm has achieved record results but also “developed an inde-


pendent corporate culture and became a forerunner in innovation and sustainability in the chemical industry”. Steilemann, currently


Retiring and incoming Covestro CEOs: Patrick Thomas (left) and Dr Markus Steilemann


INJECTION WORLD | May 2018


Covestro’s Chief Commer- cial Officer, was named as Thomas’s successor in May 2017. He is joined on the board by Chief Technology Officer Dr Klaus Schäfer, whose contract has been renewed until the end of 2022, and Dr Thomas Töpfer, who joined as Chief Financial Officer in April. � www.covestro.com


www.injectionworld.com


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