Sonoco to Acquire Assets of D&W Paper Tubes

Stora Enso has divested its three corrugated packaging plants in Russia. The Company’s Lukhovitsy, Arzamas and Balabanovo packaging plants have been divested to local management. Stora Enso’s assessment is that due to the uncertainties in the Russian market, local ownership and operation will provide a more sustainable long-term solution for these businesses and their respective employees. The transaction will have no material impact on Stora Enso’s annual sales and Operational EBIT. Due to reduced business prospects for these businesses, an impairment loss of EUR 35 million was recorded in the first quarter result. The additional loss on the transaction under IFRS will be approximately EUR 55 million, consisting mainly of currency translation adjustments to be recorded at the closing date. The expenses are considered as items affecting comparability. The divested sites are located in Lukhovitsy, Arzamas and Balabanovo employing approximately 620 people and have a total annual capacity of 395 million m² of corrugated packaging.

Aptar announced the next phase of its global capacity expansion plan in North America, at its Aptar Congers, New York site. This investment will help Aptar meet the growing prescription and consumer healthcare customer demand for proprietary drug delivery systems in North America. The North America Capacity Extension will benefit local customers. Manufacturing began at Aptar Congers in 2002 with a cleanroom and the production of Aptar Pharma’s VP3 pumps, and today the site manufactures a wide range of proprietary drug delivery products for nasal and injectable delivery routes. To support increasing patient demand for systemic nasal delivery, Aptar Pharma is significantly expanding the manufacturing capacity of its proprietary Unidose (UDS) Nasal Spray Systems via the addition of molds and assembly lines in cleanroom manufacturing settings, with the additional capacity planned to come online in Q4 2024.

Graphic Packaging Holding Company announced it will permanently decommission the K3 coated recycled paperboard (CRB) machine in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The K3 machine is one of three CRB machines at the Kalamazoo facility and is the company's longest-running machine. K3 ceased operation on July 1 and today's announcement reflects the decision to permanently shut down the 125,000-tons per annum machine. Removing higher-cost, less efficient production capacity is part of Graphic Packaging's CRB optimization plan first announced in 2019 alongside the transformational investment in a new, state-of-the-art K2 CRB machine. Permanently decommissioning the older machine is the company's next step of network optimization. With K2 reaching expected quality, cost improvement and volume commitments ahead of schedule, the permanent decommissioning of K3 supports more efficient resource use and margin enhancement goals for the CRB network, while continuing to service increased customer demand for high quality coated recycled paperboard.