Roll Change Automation Makes Tobacco Packaging Company More Efficient

In 1997, Mr. Han took Samsung into printing for tobacco packaging—cigarette boxes and wrapping papers—a niche that has become the company’s primary business. Among Samsung’s major customers is KT&G (formerly known as Korea Tobacco & Ginseng), a public corporation with the exclusive right to manufacture cigarettes in Korea. KT&G owns over 70 percent of the domestic Korean cigarette market and has expanded to southeast and central Asia, China, and the Americas, primarily with its flagship Esse and Carnival brands. And in 2011, KT&G inked significant deals to distribute its cigarettes to Russia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.