When Hüseyin Demir first stepped onto the factory floor, he wasn’t thinking about startups, algorithms, or national awards.
He was trying to understand why good ideas kept breaking down.
For 15 years working in the packaging industry, Hüseyin saw the same pattern repeat itself. Designers would produce elegant concepts — efficient, beautiful, sustainable on paper — but when those designs reached manufacturing, reality intervened.
Production teams spent days manually re-engineering them. Materials were wasted. Costs increased.And the original intent was often lost. It revealed what Hüseyin now calls a “hallucination gap” — the distance between what can be imagined and what can actually be manufactured. So he decided to close it.
A Startup Built on Real-World Problems
Rather than starting a design studio, Hüseyin founded Packniche as a deep-tech software company — aiming to build digital infrastructure for manufacturing decisions. The question was simple:
What if packaging could be engineered correctly before production even begins?
With support from the UWE Bristol Student Ventures (Spark) competition, Hüseyin built an early prototype to test whether algorithms could instantly optimise packaging for cost and waste. The results were clear: small design changes, guided by data, could dramatically reduce material usage and production inefficiencies. The idea worked — but the ambition grew.
Developing the Technology at UWE Launch Space
After validating the concept, Packniche joined UWE Launch Space, where access to the university ecosystem helped shift the startup from proof-of-concept into genuine R&D.
Here, development moved beyond simple geometry.
The team began building what Hüseyin describes as a generative manufacturing engine — software trained to understand packaging not just as shapes, but as physical objects. Folding tolerances, material stress and production constraints are now being embedded into the platform so decisions can be made digitally before the factory ever starts.
In effect, the software learns to think like an experienced production engineer. For brands, this means sustainability is no longer guesswork. It becomes measurable before anything is produced.
Recognition Beyond Startup Scale
Even while still in development, Packniche has already gained national recognition — standing alongside some of the biggest names in the industry. The company has been selected as a finalist in:
- Future Trailblazer Awards 2026 — Circularity Champion
- London Packaging Week Innovation Awards 2025
At the Trailblazer Awards, Packniche was the only early-stage startup competing against multinational manufacturers — a strong signal that independent innovation can match corporate R&D capability. At London Packaging Week, their “Manchester Collector Box” concept was shortlisted in the Luxury & Premium Packaging category, demonstrating that sustainability and premium design no longer need to be trade-offs.
Designing Out Waste Before It Exists
Packniche’s long-term goal is not simply better packaging — it’s preventative manufacturing.
As sustainability regulation increases, including Extended Producer Responsibility requirements, businesses will need to measure impact before production rather than after it.
Hüseyin’s vision is software that enables companies to engineer waste out of the system entirely — making sustainable packaging the default, not the exception.
A Journey Powered by the Ecosystem
From a student competition grant to national industry awards, the journey reflects the role of university innovation environments in helping founders test, build and scale ideas rooted in real-world experience. Now incubated within the UWE Bristol innovation community, Packniche continues development towards a full SaaS launch — translating years of practical industry insight into tools that could reshape how packaging is designed across the UK.
Sometimes innovation doesn’t start in a lab. Sometimes it starts on a factory floor — with someone asking why things keep going wrong, and deciding to build a better system.
You can learn more about Packniche at the company’s website.
