Nelipak Acquires Merrill Packaging to Expand Global Medical Packaging Business

On December 11, Zhuansu Shijie learned that the medical packaging supplier Nelipak has recently announced the completion of its acquisition of Merrill's Packaging. Merrill's Packaging specializes in providing customized thermoformed packaging solutions for the medical, pharmaceutical, and life sciences sectors.

Merrill's Packaging is headquartered in Burlingame, California, with a core business of providing custom thermoformed packaging solutions for medical devices, pharmaceuticals, life sciences, and other high-demand applications. It also offers complementary products and services such as die-cut bags, mounting cards, value-added design, R&D, and mold development. The company's production facilities are located in Burlingame, California, and Alajuela, Costa Rica. Both factories are ISO 13485 certified and equipped with ISO 8 cleanrooms.

Pat Chambliss, CEO of Nelipak, expressed strong approval of the acquisition.
"We are very pleased to welcome the Merril packaging team to the Nelipak family. We deeply respect the innovative spirit and customer-first philosophy they have demonstrated throughout their development," he stated. "Nelipak will benefit from Merril's professional team, custom thermoforming capabilities, strong customer relationships, and strategically located production bases in California and Costa Rica."

Merrill's Packaging was established in 1961, always focusing on the personalized needs of customers. With consistent quality, excellent service, continuous innovation, and professional customer support, it has established a leading position in the custom thermoforming field. Key milestones in the company's development include entering the Costa Rican market in 2010 and launching a larger production facility there in 2024.

"For Merrill's employees and customers, this is an extremely valuable growth opportunity," said Rick Schulz, CEO of Merrill Packaging. "With Nelipak's global resource network and comprehensive rigid and flexible product solutions, we look forward to exploring more new ways to create value for our customers."

Expand business layout in Costa Rica

This acquisition further strengthens Nelipak's market presence in Costa Rica. Earlier this year, Nelipak announced the construction of a new production facility in Grecia, Alajuela Province, Costa Rica, to serve customers in Costa Rica and the entire Caribbean and Central American regions.

The 60,000 square-foot (approximately 5,574 square meters) Class A industrial facility is expected to commence operations in mid-2026, significantly enhancing Nelipak's production capacity and service capabilities in the region. The new site will be ISO 13485 certified, equipped with ISO Class 7 cleanroom production space, strictly adhering to the highest quality and safety standards for sterile barrier medical packaging.

"We are excited about the start of construction at our new facility in Costa Rica," Chambliss said at the time. "This investment demonstrates our long-term commitment to customers in Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as our strategic approach to global excellence in quality and local expertise."

The base is jointly developed by Portafolio Inmobiliario, a leading real estate developer in Costa Rica, fully aligning with Nelipak's operational needs and sustainability goals.

Since Nelipak acquired ATE in 2012, it has entered the Costa Rican market and has been providing thermoformed trays, die-cut mounting cards, and other custom packaging products for leading global medical device manufacturers for many years. The new facility will further expand production capacity, covering both thin and thick gauge thermoforming, die-cut pouches, and liner products, while also providing enhanced warehousing and distribution support for Nelipak's flexible packaging product line, leaving room for future business expansion to respond to changing customer demands.

Business growth in the American market

At the end of last year, Nelipak announced the establishment of its first flexible packaging production facility in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

The facility will become Nelipak's flagship production center in North America, focusing on the production of flexible packaging products for healthcare. Previously, Nelipak has been providing such products to global customers through its three production facilities in Europe.

Nelipak's flexible packaging product line includes custom rollstock, die-cut lids and sheets, pouches, etc., utilizing various substrates such as film, Tyvek, paper, aluminum foil laminates, and integrating proprietary heat-seal coating technologies like Nelipak CR27 and Nelipak SBP2000.

This 110,000 square foot (approximately 10,219 square meters) Class A industrial building is specifically designed for Nelipak's medical packaging production needs, equipped with ISO Class 7 cleanrooms and state-of-the-art production equipment, with a quality system certified to ISO 13485.

Nelipak was founded in the Netherlands in the early 1950s and moved its global headquarters to Cranston, Rhode Island in 2013. Currently, the company has 14 production facilities worldwide, with 8 located in the Americas (United States, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico), 5 in Europe (Ireland, Netherlands, United Kingdom), and 1 in Asia (Singapore).