Ahlstrom invests in South America to support filtration customers with a new lamination capability

IG IT on November 4, 2022

Ahlstrom perpetuates its 50-year commitment and support to the global Filtration industry by investing EUR 2 million in a new laminator at Louveira plant, Brazil. With a planned installation in 2023, the equipment is expected to be fully operational by Q1 2024.

This strategic growth initiative will expand manufacturing capabilities at Louveira plant. It reinforces our ambition in local and regional filtration markets by offering customers shorter lead-times and improved local technical support.

“Along with optimizing the logistic workflow, the new unit will enable us to be closer to our customers and provide them with the flexibility needed to deliver best in class filtration solutions in South America,” said Andre Pereira, Head of Sales, Latin America.

This investment is an additional step in our ambition to strengthen the global leadership in Filtration. It completes a series of investments in the past few years to strengthen the company’s global footprint and widen our high-performance offering in filtration segments. These include a new saturator as well as a new investment for glass fiber tissue line in Madisonville (Kentucky, US), a machine rebuilt in Binzhou (China), capacity expansion in Fabriano (Italy) and Malmedy (Belgium), and a new production line in Turin (Italy).

“This investment addresses some of the current and future challenges of our customers in South America which include manufacturing flexibility and robust supply chain at regional level,” said Willy Bordignon, VP Filtration Americas. “It also demonstrates our commitment to expand product portfolio and to address the demands for lower emission engines in the region for EURO 5 and EURO 6 standards,” he continued.

Louveira is located in São Paulo state about 70 km away from the state capital. Louveira plant manufactures filter media for transportation and industrial segments, serving especially the South American markets. The plant is certified with IATF, ISO9001-2015, ISO45001 and ISO14001 and employs 120 people.

Ahlstrom in brief
Ahlstrom is a global leader in combining fibers into sustainable specialty materials. Our purpose is to Purify and Protect, with Every Fiber, for a Sustainable World. Our vision is to be the Preferred Sustainable Specialty Materials Company for all our stakeholders. We serve five growing and distinctive end markets, which form the basis for our five divisions: Filtration, Food & Consumer Packaging, Healthcare, Building Materials, and Technical Materials. Our pro forma net sales 2021 for continuing operations amounted to EUR 2.6 billion and we employ some 7,000 people.