Oman Refreshment Company (ORC), a franchisee of PepsiCo International, has acquired a new production line from Sidel to its production capacity.
The company focuses on Oman’s carbonated soft drinks (CSDs) category, which includes Pepsi, Mountain Dew and 7UP.
The company has an 89% market share of this category.
According to industry estimates, CSDs were the most consumed beverage items in Oman with 362.4 million liters recorded at the end of 2014, and a projected compound annual growth rate of 8.3% over the next five years.
Since February 2015, ORC has been operating a Sidel Matrix Combi12 line that produces carbonated soft drinks in a 2.25 liter format at a speed of 18,000 bottles per hour.
The new complete line will help the Omani company increase its bottling capacity.
The line also offers significant potential to reduce the consumption of raw materials and costs, particularly in terms of the amount of polyethylene terephthalate or PET material required to produce the bottles.
Despite the challenges presented by the carbonation process in terms of the bottle format, lightweighting has been applied to the 2.25 liter bottles by Sidel’s Packaging Services team, part of the Sidel Services business unit.
To produce the lightweighted bottles at high speed, ORC uses the Sidel Matrix Combi, an integrated blow-fill-cap solution.
Because of the neck-handling and positive transfer of bottles between blow molding and filling, the line is not bound by the limitations imposed by air conveyors.
Moreover, its overall efficiency, compact size, ergonomic design, easy maintenance and lower energy consumption all contribute to cost reductions.
