Packaging manufacturer ALPLA has launched its new factory in İzmir’s Tire district. The company has invested in two new production facilities in Adana and İzmir, with a total investment of €30 million.
Established in the Tire Organized Industrial Zone, the facility brings PET preform, cap, high-density polyethylene (HDPE) blow-molding and PET blow-molding technologies together under one roof. With the factory coming online, ALPLA’s annual processing capacity in Türkiye has increased from approximately 90,000 tonnes to 120,000 tonnes.
The investment’s contribution to Türkiye’s capacity
Speaking at the ceremony held to mark the factory’s opening, Ahmet Burak Dağlıoğlu, president of the Presidential Investment and Finance Office, said that ALPLA was a global player in its sector and had been operating in Türkiye since 1992.
Dağlıoğlu said the investments demonstrated confidence in Türkiye, adding that this confidence was supported by economic growth, stability and companies’ competitiveness in the country. He said one of Türkiye’s key advantages was its workforce and noted that the packaging industry served many different fields.
Dağlıoğlu said Türkiye’s annualized exports had reached $280 billion and that nearly 50 investments worth approximately $600 million had been implemented in the packaging sector over the past 2.5 years. He called on international companies to move activities such as research and development, logistics, regional management and training centers to Türkiye, in addition to manufacturing.
Company executives discuss the investment
ALPLA Group Chief Executive Officer Philipp Lehner said that, as a family-owned company, they took a long-term view of investments. Lehner said they had confidence in Türkiye’s production strength, industrial infrastructure, qualified human resources and growth potential.
Javier Delgado Villanueva, ALPLA’s regional general manager for Africa, the Middle East and Türkiye, said Türkiye was one of the region’s leading markets thanks to its capacity, product diversity and customer portfolio. Villanueva noted that the company’s operations in Türkiye accounted for approximately 35 percent of its regional activities.
ALPLA Türkiye General Manager Emre Canoğlu said the İzmir factory was the company’s fifth facility in Türkiye, following those in Kocaeli, Ankara, Konya and Adana. Canoğlu said producing close to customers was important because the products were bulky.
Canoğlu said Tire had significant potential in agriculture, livestock, food and dairy products. He said the company wanted to develop its activities in the milk and dairy products sector by establishing a presence in Tire, adding that the facility offered an advantage by being close to customers in the region.
Canoğlu said they aimed to use up to 50 percent recycled material at the İzmir factory and would prefer recycled raw materials obtained from waste in Türkiye instead of imported products. He also said they planned to export significant quantities of caps from the factory and that government incentives had positively affected their investment decisions and the speed of implementation.
Facility size and employment target
The facility was built on a site of approximately 50,000 square meters and has 26,000 square meters of indoor space. Once the factory reaches full capacity, it is expected to provide direct employment for approximately 120 people.
Tire District Governor Mesut Yakuta, Tire Mayor Hayati Okuroğlu and Austria’s Ambassador to Ankara Gabriele Juen attended the opening ceremony.
