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July 17, 2019 03:49 PM

Obituary: PET bottle pioneer Marty Beck

Jim Johnson
Staff Writer
Plastics News Staff
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    Beck

    Martin "Marty" H. Beck, a PET bottle pioneer, has died.

    Beck, 67, of Amherst, N.H., held more than 60 patents and was the owner of DevTech Labs, a consulting business he started after working at Monsanto and Continental Container Corp., an early PET bottle developer.

    Bradley Molnar worked with Beck for seven years at DevTech and got to know him as a friend.

    "I think what is most important is the way he dealt with the staff," Molnar said. "His employees were very important to him."

    Beck not only had intelligence to be a success in the business world but also cared about his workers, realizing life was not just about being on the job, Molnar said.

    "He always treated people with respect," he added.

    Beck graduated from Lowell Technological Institute, now the University of Massachusetts Lowell, in 1974 and formed DevTech in 1985, at first working out of his home. Success in PET bottle development allowed him to build a new facility for the business in 1997.

    Continued growth led to the formation of Preforms Plus Inc., a supplier of preforms and bottles.

    Beck sold his businesses to Envases Universales in 2015 but remained active in the business until the end of 2018 even though he was semiretired, Molnar said.

    Lou Tacito is owner of Plastics Forming Enterprises LLC, a consulting, research and engineering firm located less than a mile from DevTech, and a lifelong friend of Beck after they met in college.

    "Marty was a fierce competitor. He was always trying to win. He was a definitely a competitor in that respect. But he also looked after his people, looked at his business, as a family," Tacito said.

    "Marty was the kind of guy who always wanted to be a leader," he said. "It's hard to explain. Marty was a man's man."

    Beck worked on developing plastic bottles made from acrylonitrile for Monsanto before that material was banned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration due to leaching problems.

    "He went on to work for Continental," Tacito said, to develop a PET bottle. "He really was one of the true pioneers of bringing plastic bottles, but even before PET."

    Beck died June 15 at Lahey Hospital and Medical Center in Burlington, Mass.

    He is survived by his wife of 43 years, Jane (Ayers) Beck of Amherst; two sons, Joseph R. Beck of Albuquerque, N.M., and Jason M. Beck and his fiancee, Hannah Smith, of Manchester, N.H.; a sister, Patricia Johnson of Old Orchard Beach, Maine; a brother and sister-in-law, Robert J. and Barbara L. Beck of The Villages, Fla.; a brother-in-law and sister-in-law, Richard F. and Kathleen C. Ayers of Manchester; several nieces and nephews, grandnieces and grandnephews; the Deehy cousins; the Wood cousins and the entire DevTech Labs family, according to his obituary.

    Donations can be made in his memory to the Medical ICU at Lahey Clinic Burlington, 41 Mall Rd., Burlington, Mass., 01805, to honor the workers of the M-ICU for their professional and compassionate care they gave to him while he was under their care, the obituary states.

    "Let's continue to appreciate the footprint he has made in the industry, but let's remember the positive impact he has made on so many people around him. I know he would want us to celebrate his life, so I will do just that knowing that he will be watching from above," Molnar said.

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