HI-MORE’s Archived Report on K Trade Fair

 

As usual, K Trade Fair, held triennially in Düsseldorf, Germany, this year continues to serve as world’s most influential platform for plastics, for it gathers under one roof key players from all over the globe in the plastic industry and sets trends for insiders to follow. The issue that should be noted among Taiwanese exhibitors of plastic equipment and robotic arms was “new solutions popping up to hold sway at the venue.” For reasons? Let take a look at how major exhibitors responded to the escalating  pressure on industry insiders about environmental protection.

 

 

Plastics Solutions Focused on “Recyclable, Reusable and Reasonable Use”

 

To deal with the growing concerns worldwide about plastic waste that has seriously impacted the sustainability of lives in the earth, a number of heavyweight insiders brought their corresponding solutions to this year’s K trade fair, which turned out to be big hits with professional buyers generally anxious about the increasingly strict restrictions by global governments on use of plastics.

 

Among such exhibits, a couple of newer, innovative developed and promoted on the concept of “circularity” by Trinseo, world’s leading chemical maker, to meet the trend for a sustainable future proved to be conspicuous with visitors at the venue. Meanwhile, Hosokawa Alpine, a top-tier powder and particle processing equipment supplier, captured considerable attention on the showground with its green extruders remarked for the integration of brand new recycling solutions.

 

 

WPC: Industry Must Show Solutions

 

It is safe to say that this year’s K Trade Fair witnessed the decline of the visitor turnout whereas the significant improvement of buyer quality as well, to which the decision by the UN to put some kinds of plastics waste traded globally to Basel Convention regulations earlier was attributable. In response, WPC (World Plastics Council) called for industry insiders to take more active actions to show their green solutions.

 

At a press conference held during K Trade Fair 2019, WPC chairman Jim Seward stressed that plastics have brought tremendous invaluable benefits to people’s life in modern times for sure, but, however, inevitably taken the blame for causing impacts to the environmental sustainability. This, he added, has cast shadow to the industry’s development, and the situation will likely continue to deteriorate if the industry tends to leave it alone. Nevertheless, the chairman said he is glad to see ever more insiders take the responsibility in more positive ways that they have come up with corresponding solutions as shown at this year’s K. In the near future, people will definitely see the industry and the planet’s sustainable development reach an optimal balance, he believes.

 

Insights from HI-MORE

Inspiration to Taiwanese Suppliers: Time for Cohesion Rather Than Competing Alone, When Customers Are Looking For Truly Useful Solutions

 

So far, you must want to ask again why we would like to start this article with the issue that Taiwanese suppliers of plastic equipment and robot arms should take the trend for new solutions more seriously, at a time when more and more exhibitors K Trade Fair 2019 responded positively to concerns about environmental sustainability. To this question, the insights shared by Vic Chen, ’s president, based on his observations of the trade fair would serve as an inspirational answer.

 

Chen noted that European brands of robotic arms starting with Staubli were a striking example for Taiwanese peers who would like to survive and develop more sustainably during the transition in the industry. For instance, their robots on display impressed him with outstanding mechanical and automation system designs, all of which are optimally engineered to be well fitted into plastic processing equipment. From an intuitive point of view, the president went on, their exhibits could be seen as , and such advantages make them absolutely valuable for manufacturers who may have been forced by environmental concerns to tune their existing production systems.

 

In comparison, Chen admitted that Taiwanese exhibitors were generally unable to get themselves out of “old-fashioned” concepts of competition: competing alone, which could be reflected in their exhibited robots and equipment. To some extent, he explained, their machines could upstage competing models from Europe in terms of quality and technology applied, but showed lackluster performance when it came to compatibility or expandability for correlative equipment to work as a system or solution.  The president said, this has led to a kind of embarrassing situation to Taiwanese exhibitors, in which buyers came to their booths most often with only this question: how much is your machine?—instead of “how can you help me solve problems with your machines?”

 

To help Taiwanese suppliers to get rid of such an image among professional buyers and go upmarket, Chen has made up his mind to commence carrying out its “Strategic Alliance Exhibition” plan next year, with which HI-MORE will play like a “wingman” to assist his partners to solicit potential buyers at trade fairs with their , which, from practical viewpoints, would definitely require the integration of their plastic processing machines and HI-MORE’s robots with better tech supports. Although Chen can’t unveil details of the plan for the moment, the young entrepreneur still emphasized it is time to consider the importance of cohesion, or collective promotion, which will be a savvy strategy Taiwanese suppliers should resort to as long as the global plastic industry is busy changing manufacturing systems and looking for new solutions that can address concerns about environmental protection.

 

’s Digest: We Are Not Talking About Eco-friendliness, But Solutions

 

If you can’t get a good grasp of what HI-MORE’s president is going to suggest, just continue to read the following passage that touches on the nature of a solution.

 

A solution is a combination of physical goods and services, developed by a supplier according to description of a problem encountered by a customer (often not to expression of specific requirements) through various methods, including advices and tech support from subcontractors, upstream suppliers and downstream partners. In other words, the development of a truly effective solution that can be used to address a customer’s problem and need involves different kinds of resources that a single supplier tends not to possess. In this logic, Chen therefore insists that Taiwanese suppliers must move to team up with each others in the increasingly competitive landscape, in which cohesion is key to survival, especially when they are generally small and medium in size.

 

Furthermore, the abovementioned situation also justifies the importance of HI-MORE’s ongoing plans, including the optimization of organizational resources, modularization of every single product in its mix as well as the enhancement of cooperation with its partners. All the effort, mainly directed by Chen, who is a second-generation business owner aged only around 35 and with strong aspiration to boost the images and capabilities of Taiwanese traditional manufacturers,  is very likely to bear fruitful results starting next year.