It's heating up: keeping ahead of the thermoforming competition

Alan Wade, operations director at Shawpak, shares how the company plans to keep ahead of the thermoforming competition.

Shawpak is a UK manufacturer of a range of packaging equipment for medical devices, including rotary thermoforming machinery.

The start of Shawpak began in 2013 when David Shaw, CEO, thought that the size of a long linear thermoforming machine - which was six metres long - could be condensed into a smaller machine, but with the same input.

Alan Wade commented: “Our CEO, David Shaw had an idea at the end of 2013, to make a smaller rotary thermoforming machine.

“We started developing the first machine and took it to the first trade show, Medica, in Dusseldorf. The machine received such a great response that we knew we had to promote the machine commercially.’’

The shawpak thermoforming machine uses a rotary drum to form, fill and seal the medical devices unlike the traditional linear thermoformers. The benefit of wrapping this around a drum reduces expensive clean room space, as it’s so compact, reduces waste on blister packs and also increases flexibility to change tools over.

Riverside Medical Packaging has played a huge role in developing the shawpak machine. With their experience in packaging, they were able to assist in finding the advantages that the shawpak machine provides and overcoming many of the disadvantages that thermoforming machines generally have.

While thermoforming is a huge industry, Shawpak intends to stay ahead of the game. Wade discussed several ideas that could benefit the growth of the company, including making assemblies in advance to put into stock, so when a customer wants something, they can pull the assembly and build, rather than manufacture from new, which can reduce time significantly.

A great way of staying ahead is being out there and meeting potential customers. Shawpak stays busy with medical expos around the globe; the company exhibited at Med-Tech Innovation Expo in 2022 and has signed up for 2023, as well as MD&M West, Compamed and more.

Not only do Shawpak exhibit at expos, but the company also held its own in-house expo over three days, in July, called Shawmed. The expo consisted of showcasing many of their own machines, a factory tour of Riverside and opportunities to speak to their related companies – Amaco Flexible Print Solutions, SP Automation and Robotics and Sterimed Infection Control.

Shawpak’s range also includes the Pouch Machine and the Pouch Sealer. The Shawpak Pouch Machine launched at the start of 2021, Shawpak says it represents the best solution for packaging flat medical products. Shawpak is now developing their own rigid blister making machine.

Tony Crofts, sales director explained: ‘’To compliment our range of medical packaging machinery we are now developing a rigid blister making machine which forms the blister, die cuts the outer profile and stacks them ready for use in production.

“This along with our pouch making machine gives our customer the full flexibility in making their packaging on demand from roll stock rather than relying on their supply chain to deliver the packaging they require and keeping months of stock to ensure supply doesn’t run out. The tooling can be quickly changed to give the customer full flexibility and control, it allows you to make the blisters and pouches you require just ahead of time and not keep pallets of stock taking up space and tying up cash.‘’

Shawpak’s newest addition to the range, the Shuttle Machine, is also coming soon.