K+D ‘in touch’ with Accubraille

The second biggest player in the Swiss pharmaceutical packaging industry, K+D, based in St Gallen, is a family business led by Stefan and Werner Kuhn. The company employs 100 people, is ISO 9001 and 14001 certified, and in 2004 it was the first packaging printing plant in Europe to obtain GMP certification to ISO 15378 (for the packaging for medical products).

Accustomed to sudden audits from its pharmaceutical industry customers, which run at close to one per month, the company has a sales turnover of CHF28mn.

Having been a customer of Bobst, another Swiss company, since 1934, K+D currently has four platen die cutting presses (an SP 76-E, two Spanthera 106 LERs, and a Spanthera 106 LE), along with four folder-gluers (a Mistral50, a Mistral80, a Mistral80 and a Mistral110). Printing is delivered by manroland offset presses, while foil blocking is carried out either hot, on a Steuer PZ 90, or cold on a manroland press, according to the job.

Competence, flexibility and confidence are said to ensure to the quality of K+D’s work, with the whole business running on the principle that “nothing is impossible”. The company’s employees are geared to providing “exemplary products and packaging”. Product development services (CAD, DTP) and prepress (CTP) operate 100 per cent digitally, and are constantly employed in working to protect the brands of K+D’s pharmaceutical customers, while the shopfloor uses the latest machines and processes such as Bobst’s new Accubraille system. 

Three-quarters of K+D’s employees have technical training in the fields of printing, packaging, or logistics. A third of the workforce are women, and 11 apprentices are employed under the typically Swiss system which makes it possible to undergo a thorough training programme before the age of 20.

An average order is made up of 30,000 cartons, with repeat work representing 75 per cent of production. The work is carried out over two shifts, with a third added when necessary, and all the company’s machines are less than three years old, save for one print line.

Says Stefan Kuhn, general manager: “The equipment we use must offer great flexibility; and to achieve that, compatibility and standardisation are of primary importance”.

Braille embossing is carried out using the Accubraille system, a module that enables the company to achieve higher quality dots on its pharmaceutical packaging. 

Following the European legislation requiring the embossing of Braille dots onto pharmaceutical packaging, K+D chose the Accubraille module to carry out this operation on its Mistral80 folder-gluer, just before the gluing process.

Significant benefits

The advantages of Accubraille are said to be significant. The cost of tools is lower because it needs just one compared with the platen press’s one per station; makeready time is reduced considerably compared with the same work on a platen; the height of the dots is more precise and more uniform; and their legibility is clearly improved compared with traditional platen press dots.

Quality is also said to be consistent over long runs; and Accubraille makes it possible to apply the Braille dots close to creases in the carton.

K+D has also acquired considerable know-how in the field of brand protection, even adopting equipment suitable for the manufacture of banknotes. During its manufacture, the company’s packaging receives a combination of visible and invisible reference marks which prove the products are originals. These are applied during prepress, printing (both as inks and varnishes), and during gluing.

For Stefan Kuhn, the organisation of workflows is important, with the equipment used by the company needing to meet today’s increasing requirement for ‘just in time’ production. The machines need, among other things, electronic control systems and tools that make it possible for work to pass from one machine to another very quickly. This also eases the job of the employees and ensures that deadlines are easier to meet.

Using systems like these, it is possible to carry out short run work primarily – with certain orders being repeated every four to seven weeks - without having to manufacture stock.