NEWS | NPE 2024 REVIEW Envalior steps onto the NPE stage
The 2024 show was the NPE debut for Envalior, the new company formed from the combination of Lanxess High Performance Materials and DSM Engineering Materials in 2023. Envalior is among the top three global engineering thermoplastics (ETP) producers, said Grace Showalter, Regional Com- mercial Director – Americas, during an NPE press event. The company has a well-established worldwide presence with a network of more than 4,000 employees located across 18 produc- tion sites, 14 R&D centres and multiple sales and distribution offices. In the Americas, it operates R&D, sales and production facilities across the USA, Mexico, and Brazil. Consid- ering the strength of Envalior’s ETP product slate, including PA6, PA66, PBT, PA410, PA4T PPA, PA46, TPC, PET, PPS and compos- ite materials, the fit of the Lanxess and DSM legacy businesses has been a good one.
Showalter said the two businesses are “quite
NPE 2024 was the NPE debut for the ETP company launched in 2023
IMAGE: D ELDRIDGE
complementary in their product portfolios”, which has helped in their integra- tion. Customer bases are also complementary. “The integration of people [from the legacy businesses] has been going well,” she said. “Everybody speaks the same technical language.” Christophe Cazabeau,
Executive Vice President of Envalior’s Performance Materials division, said both the Lanxess and DSM Engineering Materials ETPs businesses have gone from being one part of a larger corporate to now being the core, and employees appreciate that. Envalior is expecting the
integration process to be completed in the latter part of this year. Cazabeau said the group may look for acquisitions in the future, but its current focus is on the integration process. One of the key sectors for Envalior is the automotive ETP materials market, including EV battery applications. “We are confident we are front runners in the market,” said Ryohei Takao, Vice President Specialty Materials at Envalior. He highlighted the importance of Envalior’s high temperature Stanyl PA 46 and its PPS materials in EV battery applications. At Envalior’s NPE booth,
it showcased high-voltage battery enclosures made of Tepex Dynalite composite material and Durethan PA6. Keith Kauffmann, Applica- tion Development Engineer at Envalior’s Americas business, said: “We are seeing an uptick in interest in plastic battery enclo- sures.” One-step processing is one of the advantages of ETP over aluminium, he said, as it eliminates the welding step. Consumer goods and medical supplies are also important markets for Envalior. At the company’s booth, the former sector was represented (among other consumer applica- tions) by Puma sports shoes that use its Arnitel material in the midsole. Arnitel is a thermoplastic copolyester material that is adaptable to various foaming techniques. The booth had an area devoted to its work in medical applications, which displayed items including catheters made with materials from the Arnitel Care range. �
www.envalior.com
NPE attracts new generation of visitors
The return of the NPE show in May after a six-year break was heralded by its organiser, the Plastics Industry Association, which announced that more than 50,000 registrants signed up for the show.
NPE has historically been the major plastics industry event in the Americas, but the association was forced to cancel the triennial show scheduled for 2021 due to restrictions caused by the Covid pandemic. In its post-show
14 COMPOUNDING WORLD | June 2024
announcement, the Plastics Industry Association said: “NPE 2024’s global reach reestablished its reputation as the international gathering place of the plastics industry in the Americas.” It reported representatives from 133 countries registered to attend NPE 2024, a 9.9% increase on the number of countries registered at NPE 2018. A notable trend was the large
proportion – 63% – of attendees who were experiencing their first NPE. The
association said 30% of attendees were under the age of 40. The association worked hard to
appeal to younger attendees, said Tammy Straw, Vice-Chair of the NPE Sales & Marketing Committee. She said a lot of networking events were held during NPE 2024, along with more educational presentations, and she also noted the appeal of new features like the Women in Plastics event. �
www.npe.org
www.compoundingworld.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56
