Lucena, Spain 05 April 2017 -- Europac is investing in its packaging operations in Spain. The company acquired its first plant in Andalusia, the Lucena corrugated board and packaging plant. It furthermore announced a €10m investment to expand in the packaging sector.

Spanish containerboard and corrugated packaging manufacturer Europac has purchased two companies that collectively own a packaging plant in Lucena in Southern Spain. The sellers are the corrugated board and corrugated packaging producers Industrias Cartones Ondulados Andaluces (ICOA) and Ondulados Andaluces (OASA), Europac reports. The transaction price was put at €9.8m.

The plant in Lucena, which be called Europack Packaging Lucena in the future, operates one corrugator and three corrugated packaging lines. According to Europac, it produced 16 million m² of corrugated board and packaging and used 7,000 t of paper last year. Sales revenues of the site amounted to over €7.6m in 2016 and EBITDA reached €1.2m.

Europac believes that the Lucena plant has a lot of growth potential. "Our goal is to establish it as a leader within the sector," said José Miguel Isidro, executive chairman of Europac.

For Europac, the acquisition is also a strategic move to expand in the packaging sector and strengthen its position in the Spanish packaging market. "Our commercial objective is to [...] move into new markets, specifically those of agriculture and food, which are especially relevant strategic sectors in Andalusia and big consumers of packaging," said Luis Serrano, country manager of Packaging Division of Europac in Spain and manager of the new plant.

In this context, Europac also announced it would carry out a €10m investment plan with the aim of increasing production, purchasing new assets, optimising the current assets and expanding the installations. It is expected that this will result in the creation of 25 direct new jobs.