OYSTAR. The Process & Packaging Group

OYSTAR IWK under New Management

The new managing directors have ambitious plans to expand the customer base.

Stutensee (Germany), March 3, 2008 | OYSTAR IWK, based in Stutensee, Germany has two new managing directors: Jens Torkel, 39, and Paulo Alexandre, 41, are replacing Hans Seydel, who managed the company until his recent retirement. Jens Torkel is the senior managing director and is in charge of sales, development and engineering; Paulo Alexandre is responsible for procurement, manufacturing, assembly and services as well as for the financial and HR functions. IWK Verpackungstechnik GmbH is a member of OYSTAR, The Process & Packaging Group, formerly the packaging machinery division of IWKA AG.

Jens Torkel has a degree in industrial engineering. His first position was with Fette GmbH, a tablet press manufacturer, where he managed the North and South American markets before heading up the mechanical engineering marketing division. In 1999 he transferred to Kilian & Co Inc in the USA for four years. Following Kilian’s acquisition by IMA, Torkel was appointed vice-president of the U.S. subsidiary. His responsibilities included tableting machinery, capsule fillers, coaters and fluid beds. In January 2004 he was appointed managing director for sales at IMA Kilian GmbH & Co. KG, Germany.

Describing his goals, Torkel says “We want to become more innovative and extend our tube filling and sealing machinery production capacities, especially in Asia. At the same time we are looking to significantly expand our customer base.”

Paulo Alexandre is also an industrial engineer and began his career with Agfa-Gevaert. After holding positions in the Rheinmetall group he joined Horvath & Partners management consulting as a principal. In 2005 he switched to IWKA AG, where he managed the OYSTAR Group’s financial and controlling operations in Stutensee until his present appointment.

Paulo Alexandre’s objective is to improve the company’s operating performance. “Shorter lead times and process optimization are key to strengthening our market position, especially against the background of growing competition from the Far East," he says.

Both managing directors want to drive integration in the OYSTAR Group, because they regard modular and metrics-based system design as an integral part of product development, giving the Group and its members extreme flexibility with respect both to cost structures and to the applications they can implement. Faster time-to-market increases products’ attractiveness. The new managing directors will focus initially on the pharmaceutical industry, since they aim to achieve greater market penetration in this sector.

Profile

The OYSTAR IWK product portfolio includes tube fillers, cartoners, blister machinery, and handling systems for the cosmetics and pharmaceutical industries. As of January 2008, the company employed 336 people, including apprentices, at its Stutensee facilities.

The company was set up in 1893 to supply “machinery to fill and seal tubes.” 1907 saw the foundation of “Maschinen für Massenverpackungen GmbH” in Berlin-Neukölln. This company manufactured a wide range of products, including filling equipment, pouch and development machinery, tablet packaging equipment, and tube filling and sealing machinery, and was integrated into Industriewerke Karlsruhe (IWKA) AG in 1929. In 1979 it became an independent entity within IWKA AG under the name of IWK Verpackungstechnik.

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