Austrian packaging producer Hirsch Servo is setting up a second expanded polystyrene (EPS) products plant in Romania to enable it to serve expanding electronics giant Samsung.

Hirsch, based in Glanegg, Austria, currently supplies Samsung with its Porozell packaging for consumer electronics products from its plant in Jászfényszaru, Hungary. But, as Samsung expands to serve growing market demand for its consumer equipment lines in Romania, Hirsch aims to launch a new unit in Oradea, Romania.

The plant, with a capacity to turn out 600 tonnes of packaging per year, will occupy leased premises in Oradea. Its production start up is scheduled for August this year, according to Hirsch Servo group.

“Hirsch’s philosophy is to manufacture packaging as close to the customer as possible in order to avoid shipping products over long distances and to reduce carbon emissions in the long term,” explained Siegfried Wilding, the group board member responsible for its EPS Processing business.

The new plant is primarily set to manufacture a range of EPS packaging products for Samsung monitors, televisions, audio and video systems. Prior to the production unit’s summer launch, the Austrian supplier will make use of all the leased buildings in Oradea for storage.

Hirsch has been manufacturing a range of EPS insulation materials at its existing Romanian plant in Cluj. The group’s core EPS Processing business manufactures in Glanegg, Austria, at two more plants in Hungary in Nyíregyháza and Sárvár; two in Poland at Wroclaw and Lodz; as well as at two in Slovakia.

The group product portfolio also includes construction blocks, its Thermozell lightweight concrete products and transport pallets.