Krones builds one of the world's most modern water factories in Saudi Arabia

The market for bottled water in Saudi Arabia is expected to grow organically by almost nine percent annually through 2025, driven in part by a shift toward mass production of water in PET bottles. Although the market is highly competitive, it is also an open one with room for new developments.

One recent entrant is Jasmine Water and Beverages Factory (JWBF), behind whose parent company is a highly regarded Saudi family who have previously focused their activities on real estate, agriculture, and general investment. The family now aims to redefine the packaged water business in the region, running an eco-friendly bottling plant: There, it takes less than one hour for the water to travel from the deep wells into bottles, so there’s no storage involved and no chlorine is used in product water processing.

One of the world's most modern water factories

“Clean, reliable drinking water in bottles will be the order of the day for many years to come – it’s the future, not only in Saudi Arabia but around the world,” says Ashraf El-Nahas, Factory General Manager. “Our ViVi water is sourced directly from deep wells in the Al-Reem Dunes, in the region of Al-Muzahimiyah, far from any sources of contamination. ViVi water is refreshing, clean, and of high quality – just as healthful drinking water in bottles should be.”

To ensure that is the case, the family has had the ViVi Water Factory designed and built to be one of the most technologically advanced water filling plants in the world. The infrastructure and the building itself are laid out to house six high-speed filling lines, four injection molding machines for preform production, and two injection molders for producing caps.

The new plant began operation in mid-2021. And though it was, by definition, a “greenfield” project, the verdant imagery certainly doesn’t apply here – the factory is situated in the middle of the desert outside Riyadh, as a film by JWBF impressively shows:

Krones scope of delivery:

Phase one is dimensioned for a capacity of around 1.5 million bottles per 8-hour shift. For it, Krones installed two turnkey lines, each featuring ErgoBloc L technology (see infobox).

The plant produces 21 different SKUs (stock keeping units) with 200-, 330-, 600- and 1,500-milliliter containers. For end-of-the-line packaging, Jasmine can choose from wraparound cartons, shrink trays and cardboard pads with shrink film in a variety of configurations.

Jasmine began the market launch in Riyadh in July 2021 and was able to expand to Saudi Arabia’s other major cities by the end of 2021.