JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #83 - August/September 2013 - 8

point of view: looking to the future

Owens Corning is leveraging its resources in locations like Gous-Khrustalny,
Russia (pictured above), to meet both domestic and regional demand for its
composite solutions.

p5/... imaginative and open to
alliances that will enable us to
deliver even greater value to our
customers and shareholders. To
this end, we’ll continue to be
open minded about strategic partnerships that can help us capture
opportunities and value.
JCM: It’s now a year since you
opened your composites centre
in Shanghai. What precisely is its
mission, and do you anticipate
expanding its field of investigation?

A. G. : The concept behind
the decision to build our China
Composites Centre in Shanghai was really very simple:
to establish a state-of-the-art
application development centre
dedicated to meeting the technology and innovation needs of
the Chinese market, in China.
Owens Corning has a strong
legacy in China where we benefit
from our “first-in” position supporting the wind energy market.
The new centre is a natural
extension of this legacy with its
mission to serve as a hub for the
Chinese composites industry by
improving existing applications,
developing new applications

for performance markets, and
training generations of composites engineers. Today, our team
is working with local customers,
partners, and universities to
explore and develop next-generation composite solutions. As we
approach the one-year anniversary of the centre’s opening last
September, I can tell you that we
are excited about the role that
the centre will continue to play
in advancing composites growth
in the world’s fastest growing
market.
JCM: The construction sector,
with which by its nature you are
closely associated, seems to be
one of your core concerns. Is it a
sector that offers greater growth
potential than the others for glass
fibre?

A. G. : Absolutely. We consi-

der the building materials and
construction market to be
the fastest-growing sector for
composites. On average, a new
house in the U.S. consumes 100
kg of glass. This creates a variety
of opportunities for composite
products in roofing shingles,
window profiles, showers, tubs,
and many other applications.

Looking to the future, evolving
demographics provide further
support for growth in this
market. The U.N. has estimated
that human population will
grow to 9.6 billion by 2050, up
from 7.2 billion people today.
The majority of this growth is
expected to occur in developing
nations, where transportation
and housing will be needed.
Near- and longer-term opportunities in the building materials
market were a key factor in our
recently announced decision
to build a new $130 million
non-wovens facility in North
America. There is a limited
supply of glass non-woven products serving the global building
materials market today. And with
the optimistic projections for
long-term growth, our customers
have told us that they are eager
for Owens Corning to offer more
of our products and solutions to
support this growth.
JCM: What application markets
and countries are your priority
targets today?

A. G. : Today, much of our
focus is on sustainable building
material products, new long-fibre
thermoplastic solutions, and
corrosion-resistant applications.
In recent years, we have concentrated on emerging markets
such as China, India, and Latin
America. We like our position in
these markets and will continue
to develop them. But we will also
continue working hard to take
advantage of the opportunities
for composites relative to the
U.S. building recovery and global
vehicle “lightweighting” that I
mentioned earlier.
JCM: More globally, what do you
see the medium-term future
having in store for composites
(markets, innovation, challenges

8 jec composites magazine / No83 August - September 2013

to be faced, competition between
players, external competition from
other materials, etc.)?

A. G. : I am very optimistic
about the future of composites.
Market indicators are strong, a
number of economies are improving, and I have great underlying
confidence in the technical and
economic attributes that composites offer for so many markets.
Our prime area of concern today
is securing fair glass fibre pricing,
which is intrinsic to our ability
to continue reinvesting in the
business. Improved profitability
will be critical to ensuring that
we are able to invest in innovation, maintain our manufacturing
capacity, and grow. There are two
basic drivers for pricing: capacity
utilization and value creation
through innovation. Industry
projections for capacity utilization are positive, both during the
balance of this year and in 2014,
which supports price realization.
We have significantly increased
our innovation investment
around product performance.
The goal here is to provide our
customers with products that
allow them to boost their
profits thanks to productivity
improvements or product
re-engineering, and share in
the value that we have jointly
created.
Overall, I am very pleased with
how Owens Corning’s composites business is positioned for
the future. We have a great combination of low-delivered-cost
platforms, quality products, and
a strong innovation agenda – all
of which will help ensure that we
continue to deliver the solutions
that our customers expect. n
More information:
www.owenscorning.com
http://www.owenscorning.com
JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #83 - August/September 2013

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