ROI: Why a rewinding and slitting machine is a worthwhile investment

If a machine pays for itself within a few years and the return on investment is several hundred per cent, the decision to buy is really a no-brainer. Using the NEPATA UA1650 ADWS as an example, CEO Fabian Franke explains why a rewinding and slitting machine pays for itself so quickly.

An article by Fabian Franke, CEO of NEPATA, June 2024

Practical experience shows that NEPATA’s rewinding and slitting solutions deliver productivity gains of 40 per cent or more compared with standard converting equipment. This article illustrates this using the example of the UA1650 ADWS, NEPATA’s best-selling machine. Even if it saves a warehouse worker just one hour a day, it will have paid for itself within five years at the latest – with a service life of well over ten years. In fact, the potential savings are significantly higher, as the precision converting centre also prevents material waste, errors and customer complaints, whilst improving the workflow in the warehouse.

Anyone who does not convert film media on an industrial scale faces a dilemma: expensive manual labour or an expensive machine? Simple devices are sufficient initially for rewinding, length trimming and slitting. However, the manual labour involved makes the business laborious and weighs on profitability – after all, warehouse staff must be paid a fair wage, assuming you can find them at all. On the other hand, an investment in greater automation – specifically in a rewinding and cutting solution costing the equivalent of a mid-range car – is a significant financial commitment to begin with.

I would like to illustrate this using the example of the Nepata UA1650 ADWS precision centre for converting.

Our example warehouse operator, Max, earns an hourly rate of around 35 euros for one productive hour’s work here in Germany. This figure already takes into account holidays, sick leave and unproductive time such as training sessions, meetings, etc. In an average month, he works 18 to 19 working days. If Max saves just one hour a day on converting tasks by using the Nepata UA1650 ADWS, the machine will have paid for itself after five years. At an average utilisation rate, significantly greater labour savings – perhaps as much as double – should be possible. For that reason alone, the machine would have paid for itself after 2.5 years. Moreover, the machine easily has a service life of ten years or more.

I gather from users’ experiences that saving one to two hours a day is entirely realistic. These experiences show that:

This makes the NEPATA-UA series machines some of the most efficient and productive film-conversion solutions in the world. In particular, when used in conjunction with the ConvertPlus control software, cutting operations can be carried out exceptionally quickly.

The following list is not exhaustive and deliberately omits technical details. However, it is intended to illustrate where the potential for productivity gains lies.

But what will warehouse assistant Max do with the time he saves? Believe me, he won’t be bored. Because let’s be honest: your warehouse team is probably already struggling to keep up with the orders as it is…

The return on investment is already continuing to rise.

If employees are now relieved of some of their workload through greater automation and software support, this reduces stress. Ultimately, this means fewer sick days and lower staff turnover. And so the ROI rises once again. After all, downtime is just as unprofitable as finding and training new staff.

Let’s move away from working hours and look at the material. Thanks to the high measuring accuracy of our machines, the following applies:

With simpler rewind machines, a small amount must be added during each rewind operation to ensure that the customer does not receive a roll that is too short. At the end of the roll, there is no longer a full metre left, but rather an unsaleable remnant. Assuming that only 49 metres of a 50-metre roll can be sold, this equates to two per cent waste of the total film volume. With an annual purchase volume of 500,000 euros, the NEPATA-UA machine saves 10,000 euros through this alone. The machine therefore pays for itself by the end of the fourth year of operation – solely as a result of this effect.

There is even more potential for savings when it comes to materials: the ConvertPlus software helps to avoid typical errors – rolls that are too long or too short, the wrong colours, or a matt finish instead of a gloss finish. Or, for example, six metres might be unwound from a ten-metre roll for a customer, but the customer is accidentally sent the remaining four-metre roll. Such errors lead to complaints, tie up capacity, increase material consumption and reduce profitability.

Here’s how our control software helps to prevent errors:

Incidentally, ConvertPlus provides you with a tool to improve your warehouse logistics. Here’s an overview of three key aspects:

The time saved alone makes the purchase of a NEPATA-UA series rewinding and slitting machine highly cost-effective. Avoiding material waste alone leads to a rapid return on investment. Added to this are further optimisations in complaint handling and warehouse logistics, which add up significantly over the years. Taken as a whole, this results in a return on investment of several hundred per cent: the UA1650 ADWS conversion centre pays for itself within a few years. Or to put it another way:

And beyond the figures: an improved workflow forms the basis for satisfied staff, long-term customer relationships and sustainable growth.

Would you like to increase the profitability of your converting processes? Arrange a brief presentation on workflow using NEPATA’s machinery and software.