Dai Nippon Printing Co., Ltd. (DNP) has developed a new sealant film equipped with linear tearing properties, superior heat sealability and heat resistance, as a next generation film for food packaging. By using this new product in packaging materials, it is now possible to manually open packaging for boil-in-the-bag foods and special formats, such as tetrahedron shapes, without the need for scissors. The Company is also pleased to announce that this new product has been adopted for a new line of candies from Ezaki Glico Co., Ltd.

[Background]

Recent years have seen the advanced introduction of Universal Design concepts that make goods easier to use for a majority of people in society, and there have been calls for packaging that children and seniors can open neatly with less power. Many packaging materials bond together film with different functionalities in two to three layers, to provide high performance, including contents protection. Originally, linear tear-open function was provided by stretching the surface film, as there were challenges to opening in a straight line due to the thickness of the packaging materials, and the impact of the innermost sealant film comprising the sealing functions. On the other hand, when sealant film is stretched, the stretched sealant film resulted in a higher melting point. This made it necessary to seal contents at a higher temperature, through bag formation and contents filling processes, which created the challenge of a surface film being melted.
In order to overcome this challenge, DNP devised a means to lower the melting point of the stretched film, and has successfully developed a new sealant film that secures sealing and heat resistant properties similar to currently available products, while also sporting superior linear tear-open properties,  

[Features]

• Facilitates linear tear-open as a packaging material, allowing the user to open the packaging in a straight line manner from the start of the cutting edge to the finish
  
• Maintains heat sealability similar to currently available products, and superior bagging aptitudes.
  
• As the new packaging can withstand temperatures of approximately 135∘C, it can be applied in the high temperature sterilization of boil-in-the-bag foods, allowing for a long term preservation.

[Ezaki Glico]

The newly developed sealant film was adopted by Ezaki Glico for use in candy style products on March 28, 2017. The new packaging allows for the straight-line tear-opening even for tetrahedron shaped packaging.

[Forward Looking Developments]

DNP will market the newly developed sealant film to the foods, pharmaceutical and daily necessities industries, aiming for sales of 1.0 billion yen in FY 2020.

* Product prices, specification and service contents mentioned in this news release are current as of the date of publication. They may be changed at any time without notice.