Paper and packaging group Sappi has sold its Nijmegen mill, in the Netherlands, to an affiliate of American Industrial Acquisition Corporation.
In September last year, the group announced that it had generated a loss in its European activities as a result of the continued market decline and consequent overcapacity in the European coated paper markets, combined with high raw material costs not compensated for by higher selling prices.
It had, therefore, decided to concentrate its production at fewer sites.
Exhaustive analysis had indicated that the preferred option would be to relocate the entire production of Nijmegen mill to other Sappi mills in Europe, to optimise the group’s entire Heat Set Web Offset business.
The disposal of Nijmegen became effective June 16, with the mill now called Innovio Papers.
Following the disposal, the mill would now manufacture speciality paper and would no longer be engaged in the coated graphic paper business, Sappi said in a statement, adding that a transfer plan had been arranged with the mill’s current graphic paper customers.