Packaging specialist Sonoco (Hartsville, South Carolina / USA; www.sonoco.com) is to centralise its plastics operations under a single corporate brand, “Sonoco Plastics”. The business offers a wide range of plastics packaging, utilising blow moulding, thermoforming, injection moulding and extrusion technologies. The reorganisation follows the acquisition of Associated Packaging Technologies (APT, Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania / USA; www.aptechnologies.com) for USD 120m (EUR 88m) in June 2010 – see Plasteurope.com of 06.07.2010. Bob Puechl, division vice president, Sonoco Plastics, said: “Sonoco entered the plastics business more than 50 years ago. Throughout the years, we built a diverse plastics packaging portfolio with key acquisitions such as Crellin, Burk, ClearPack and Matrix. With the acquisition of APT in June, the time was right to establish a unified plastics brand to better leverage financial resources, identify additional efficiencies, and enhance our reputation.”