Laser solution for Sealpac GmbH: Flexibility for the requirements of today and tomorrow

During the daily walk to the supermarket or to the butcher's shop, one very often comes into contact, at least indirectly, with the precision machines of Sealpac GmbH, a company based in Lower Saxony, Germany. The globally active high-tech company from Oldenburg develops and manufactures systems for food packaging. The employees of Sealpac follow the maxim to set new standards in automated food production and always offer the best solution. According to Sealpac, these are not only characterized by high performance and flexibility, but also by tested and reliable quality and maximum efficiency. This means: innovative spirit and precision work are part of the daily work – right from the start.

More than 33 years ago the starting signal was given in the domestic garage. Today, 250 employees work at the Oldenburg site alone, and the products are available in more than 60 countries worldwide. Industry giants such as Edeka, Wiesenhof or the Tönnies group of companies rely on Sealpac systems – but also small butcher shops, bakeries and food processors for meat, baked goods, fruit, vegetables and more. In October 2018, the sustainable and material-friendly FlatSkin® system received the ECMA Award (European Carton Makers Association) in the category "Save the Planet".

The German company Sealpac GmbH is one of the world's leading manufacturers of systems for automated food packaging. More than 250 employees work at the headquarters in Oldenburg.

"In addition to the well-trained staff, humanity in the company is one of our strengths. Everyone knows each other by first name, the official channels are very short, the hierarchies very flat," says Samir Ramadan. He is in the production planning department at Sealpac and, like production manager Sascha Westphal, started as a machine operator. "Our managers all come from the field. That helps with all challenges. Our people program themselves; we have well-trained and autonomous personnel," says Ramadan. And this is also necessary, because often the systems have to be individually adapted to the customer's requirements – this involves accuracies in the thousandth of a millimeter range. The machine park is set up accordingly, investments in modern systems are made on an ongoing basis, and purchases must also meet production requirements for the longer term.

Sealpac GmbH invested in a flexible laser cutting system of the MSF series from MicroStep. This combines technology options for pipe, profile and sheet metal processing with a high degree of automation for loading and unloading the material.

In 2017, managing director Jörg von Seggern, Sascha Westphal and Samir Ramadan set out to find a suitable laser cutting solution for cutting pipes and profiles. Milling machines and other technologies were to be released for other tasks and the dependence on contract cutters was to be reduced. "The aim of the new acquisition was to create free capacities", Samir Ramadan looks back.


Sheets, pipes and profiles are processed by means of a laser rotator. The MicroStep laser rotator including an automatic Highyag BIMO FSC laser cutting head enables bevel cuts up to 45°, for example for weld edge preparation.

The decision makers took their time in analyzing the laser cutting systems that were available on the market. "The basic idea was a pure pipe and profile laser. We looked at many of them and the idea was born to include the processing of flat material. But we primarily process pipes and profiles," says Ramadan. After weighing up all the parameters and comparing the laser systems offered, the decision was made in favor of a multifunctional solution from MicroStep with a high degree of automation. The reason: the wide range of technology options and the resulting flexibility for the development and manufacture of the current and future product portfolio.


In addition to pipe and profile processing, the MSF at Sealpac also enables the cutting of sheets with a panel size of up to 4,000 x 2,000 mm. The material is loaded and unloaded via a fully automatic shuttle table system.

"We have cutting jobs, for example the processing of bone profiles, where we need 8 minutes now instead of 35," said Samir Ramadan.