Technology company Pitney Bowes SA released the latest version of the CMC CartonWrap ‘Dynamic box on demand’ solution in South Africa this year.

CMC CartonWrap is an automatic carton- packaging system capable of creating dynamic cardboard boxes from a continuous corrugated carton material reel.

Pitney Bowes SA has been appointed the sole distributor for CMC Automated solutions in the Southern Africa region and neighbouring countries. The CMC CartonWrap solution was initially released in 2013; however, it has since undergone enhancements based on different market demands.

“CartonWrap is a production solution that is custom-built, unique to each customer’s application . . . therefore, there are no fixed off-the-shelf dimensions. However, a typical basic solution will cover about 20 m2 of floor space,” says Pitney Bowes SA.

The solution produces boxes from a simple and inexpensive corrugated cardboard reel in real time, each one unique to the products being boxed. The real-time format change is managed automatically through product size recognition. Each carton-wrapped box is personalised and unique details are directly linked and obtained from a database ensuring optimal processing flexibility.

The Internet is driving online buying of the solution and, therefore, CMC designed the solution to address the needs of shippers, such as ecommerce and fulfilment companies, which have to procure and stock multiple boxes of different sizes to meet varying packaging requirements, the company notes.

“The target market is very specific; however, we have found that there is a significant fit in terms of sectors we had not initially envisaged; hence, the market’s appetite for the product is definitely better than we expected. If we keep the concept of optimisation, efficiency and maximising bottom line improvements in mind, the possibilities are endless,” says Pitney Bowes SA executive manager Victor Queiroz.

He further notes that there are currently no offerings in the market that have the same features and functionality as the CartonWrap solution.

Features and benefits of the product include different-sized-boxes stock availability, as there is no need to procure and stock boxes of different sizes because the boxes are created to accommodate and fit the products being packaged in real time. This also eliminates the risk of not having the correct-size box in stock.

The product also requires less warehouse space, as only reels need to be stored, and filler materials such as polystyrene chips, bubble wrap and shredded paper are eliminated. The solution’s environmental impact is less, with increased packaging productivity and efficiency through automation.

To ensure successful installation of the packing system, Pitney Bowes SA has invested in local sales, technical, project management, roll-out and skills-transfer teams by means of extensive international training and global market mentoring by CMC.

The CartonWrap solution is entirely managed by the company’s local team. Installation of the product depends on the size of the project and the end-to-end solution scope; however, the time from receiving an order to the product being supplied is estimated to be six to eight months.

“With innovative and creative thinking, there are no limits to optimisation and automation solutions in terms of packaging and delivery. If customers can think it, we will explore a solution together with the client and our global and local partners,” concludes Queiroz.