Packaging giant Amcor splits local business

Australian multinational packaging company, Amcor will spin-off its local metal canning, glass bottling and fibreboard business and its Australasian and North American packaging distribution assets into a separate entity.

The new business, Amcor Australasia and Packaging Distribution (AAPD), will leave the core Amcor business free to focus on its global plastics and flexibles business, according to Amcor chief executive Ken Mackenzie.

He said the new company will be a regionally focused company, with two thirds of its business in Australia and New Zealand, and a third in North America.

"Although Amcor and AAPD are both packaging companies they are actually very different in terms of product segments and geographic focus," Mackenzie told a media briefing.

He said the decision to split the company followed an eight-year period of transformation, during which the AAPD segment had been rationalised to focus on four core business areas: fibre, glass and metal packaging and packaging distribution.

He said the Australasian and North American operations that will make up AAPD had long been a division of its own within Amcor.

“They are a good fit as they operate in the same segments,” he said. “Both Australasia and North America do distribution and they also both manufacture corrugated boxes. They logically fit together.”

AAPD will be headed up by current Amcor president, Nigel Garrard, who will act as chief executive.