At Emballage, innovative pallets manufacturer PVAXX was busy fielding inquiries from companies worldwide for its non-wood, re-usable and economical product that is set to revolutionise the transportation of goods.

The Paris exhibition was one more exercise for PVAXX in its campaign to acquaint markets about its pallets and assess demand.
The company now expects to sell its first pallets in the first quarter of this year. It has a manufacturing, training and demonstration facility at Dubai’s Jebel Ali Free Zone. The patented production line equipment is built by PVAXX in Bahrain and the company is developing a site in Sohar, northern Oman, as a major manufacturing facility.
PVAXX vice-president for sales and marketing Jan Bak said the company had finalised a number of orders and was fielding enquiries from a large number of parties interested in the many advantages his company’s pallets offered over traditional products.
“We’re currently holding orders well in excess of 1 million pallets and most orders have come from the Middle East and Europe,” Bak said. “We have been to major exhibitions in Dubai, Brisbane, Singapore, Shanghai, Birmingham, Chicago and Paris and there’s great interest in what we’re offering.”
The pallets are made of a patented siluma composite. The Bermuda-based company retains full patent protection of the unifier, the manufacturing process and pallet design.
Competitive advantages that PVAXX pallets enjoy are that they can be easily sterilised, are recylable and flame-resistant and follow ISO standard bar-coding, while also providing the option of embedded RFID, which is fast becoming an essential and required feature for logistics tracking.
The company is targeting pallet pooling companies, courier companies, national grocery and retail chains, food and beverage providers and industrial groups.
“Unlike traditional wood pallets, our pallets do not utilise a scarce natural resource, they are not susceptible to insect attacks, they allow sterilisation, are recyclable and UV-resistant. They are also strong and durable, protected from splintering and have a longer life,” said Bak.
“The alternative to wood would be plastic. However, the problem is that plastic is expensive. We’re positioning ourselves between the expensive injection-moulded high-density polyethylene plastic pallets and wooden pallets.” A standard-size HDPE pallet would cost $60, wooden pallet $10 and PVAXX pallet $40.
“The strength and durability of PVAXX pallets make them last 100 trips while first class wooden ones would be good for just 10,” explained Bak. “While plastic pallets offered the same number of trips, PVAXX has the cost advantage.” The company’s pallets have a static load-baring capacity up to 4,500 kg on flat ground, and can bear dynamic loads (for example on forklifts) of 1,500 kg and racking up to a minimum of 1,000 kg.
At a time when great importance is attached to environmental issues, PVAXX stresses its pallets do not deplete natural resources. About 1 million acres of hardwood are forested each year to make 600 million new wooden pallets in North America alone. Environmental pressures, regulations and increasing lumber costs are making wooden pallets increasing undesirable.
PVAXX’s food-grade pallets will be designed to allow circulation of air and drainage of water. They will have an anti-slip surface, which will keep the products in position during transportation. The design would also enable use on rails, thereby greatly facilitating movement. Most importantly, they will fulfill international regulations and requirements of the food industry, including HACCP.
However, the long-term goal for PVAXX is to have their pallets manufactured worldwide, and it is currently assessing demand and determining sites ideal for future production. We’re still assessing the best sites on a global basis,” insisted Bak. “The main reason for participating in exhibitions is to gain market knowledge on volumes, so that from knowing volumes we can have an idea about the plant capacities we’d need.”
Bak feels the Gulf potential is of the order of 5-8 million pallets per year. “Our goal is to create a global capacity of 16 million pallets per year in three years’ time,” he said. PVAXX will through its own facilities or and in the long term through its Territorial Manufacturer and Distributor (TMD) programme supply the global market. Under the TMD programme it will joint venture with qualified industrial partners with an industrial or shipping background and distribute PVAXX pallets within a particular territory not viable to receiving pallets shipped from the Middle East.
PVAXX Industries in Bahrain is utilising a consortium of local Bahraini companies for the fabricating and assembly of parts for the production lines used in PVAXX pallet factories.
PVAXX Ltd, the parent company, is a material science and technology group. Among its achievements are providing the technology for biodegradable material in the manufacture of Reckitt & Benkisser tablets, shotgun cartridges manufactured by Elly Hawk and casing for Motorola mobile phones.