DIC Signs Letter of Intent to Take Over All Businesses of New Zealand’s Pacific Inks

Tokyo, Japan—DIC Corporation announced today that on December 1, 2011, wholly owned Singapore-based subsidiary DIC Asia Pacific Pte Ltd reached an agreement with Pacific Inks Limited of New Zealand for the DIC Group to take over all of Pacific Inks businesses.

In addition to its mother plant in Auckland, New Zealand, Pacific Inks has plants in Oceania (Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, Australia), Asia (Singapore, Malaysia and the People’s Republic of China) and the United Kingdom. The division of operations between the mother plant and the regional mixing plants facilitates outstanding productivity. With a product lineup centered on packaging inks for cardboard, Pacific Inks enjoys a particularly favorable reputation for its environment-friendly water-based flexo inks.

Demand for packaging inks remains firm in developed countries—reflecting rising living standards and the prevalence of individual packaging for many items—and in the Asia–Pacific region is expected to grow by about 10% annually for the foreseeable future. In recent years, DIC has addressed the need to fortify its capabilities in the packaging inks business as a principal strategic theme. This acquisition will enable DIC to add water-based flexo inks to its portfolio and strengthen its operations, particularly in the Asia–Pacific region where environmental awareness is increasing rapidly. This, together with Pacific Inks’ proprietary Accubatch system and DIC’s own extensive range and global network, will position DIC to respond effectively to expanding demand for packaging inks.

Thanks to a reinforced product lineup and broad commercial rights, including key major customers, and to the addition of water-based flexo inks to the lineup of products generated by its existing facilities, DIC forecasts this acquisition will add \2.5 billion to annual net sales by fiscal 2015. By rationalizing existing facilities and plants newly acquired from Pacific Inks in the Asia–Pacific region, DIC will also strive to further improve production efficiency.


Accubatch system
Pacific Inks has developed the Accubatch automatic ink dispensing and blending system. The installation of an Accubatch system enables customers (printing companies) to blend their own inks on-site and to ensure intermediates, such as varnishes and pastes with dispersed pigments, are always on hand. When a particular ink is required, the customer simply enters the appropriate information into the system, which blends pigments and varnish to manufacture the appropriate product. This enables printing companies to produce the amount of ink they need when they need it, significantly reducing the time and effort necessary for inventory and order management both for themselves and for ink manufacturers.