State of the Industry: Global Consolidation in Packaging

Within plastic packaging, more than 70 percent of 2010's 159 deals involved an international or cross-border participant. This shows a 10-percentage point increase during the past decade in international participation. Strategic deals and consolidations backed by private equity funds have increased from 78 to 84 percent of total deals during the past ten years, proving that financial involvement has had a strong impact on the plastic packaging sector. Representative deals in plastics packaging this year include Mid Oak's acquisition of flexible packaging supplier Plastics Packaging Technologies, and Graham Packaging's purchase of blow molder Liquid Container from Mid Oaks for $568 million.