Plastics News Daily Report - May 9, 2018 - 10

10 ‹ PLASTICS NEWS DAILY REPORT ‹ May 9, 2018

Elastron invests $10M in US TPE plant
Turkish plastic compounder Elastron Kimya SA thinks
it's found a niche in the North
American plastics market and is
investing $10 million in a new facility in the United States.
The Gebze, Turkey-based
company said at NPE2018 that it
started exporting thermoplastic
elastomer compounds to North
America in 2012 and said it's
found enough demand to justify
the investment in the Gainesville, Ga., facility.
"The response of our U.S.
customers has increased tremendously," said Zev Gurion,
general manager of North American operations. "They needed a
supplier that is focused on the
customer and not rigid."
Elastron first disclosed the
investment in October at Germany's Fakuma trade fair, describing it as a $10 million investment
with an initial production capacity of 3,500 metric tons (7.7 million pounds).
Gurion said the company has
since decided to speed the investment - he described those
earlier capacity figures as "modest" - and said the facility will
initially be larger. He declined,
however, to provide details.
"We'll have enough capacity
to address customer needs for
three to five years," he said.
It's the second non-U.S. compounder to recently announced
an investment in the U.S. market
for TPEs.

Plastics News photo by Michael A. Marcotte

By Steve Toloken
Plastics News Staff

Zev Gurion, general manager of North American operations (left), and Yuksel Habip, global business director
for Elastron Kimya SA, at the company's NPE2018 booth.

China's Top Polymer Enterprise Ltd. said on the eve of
Chinaplas in April that it was
planning a $15 million TPE compounding facility, also in Georgia.
Gurion said in Elastron's case,
the company made a detailed
examination of the North Amer-

ican market and determined
there was space for a very customer-focused company that
could respond quickly to market
needs.
"We are very excited about expanding our global production
capabilities to the North American market," said Metin Mizrak-

li, chairman and CEO. "We are
fully committed to supplying
our customers with high-quality
thermoplastic elastomers."
The company started 35 years
ago and currently exports to 55
countries from its factory, near
Istanbul.
The firm makes a variety of

BOOTH S16103
ELASTRON KIMYA SA
TPEs, including thermoplastic
vulcanizates compounds, along
with styrenic block-based copolymers and styrene ethylene butylene materials.
Gurion said the new facility
will start with about 20 employees, but he hopes it will grow to
70 or 80 employees in five years
and add more product lines.
As well, Gurion, a longtime executive in ExxonMobil Chemical
Co.'s Santoprene TPV business
before joining Elastron in 2006,
said the company wants to add
more product development capabilities to increase its ability
to respond faster to the local
market.
"We hope to eventually have
local R&D," he said. "The key is
speed to market."
Meanwhile, Elastron also said
it has decided to postpone a
planned investment in a similar
compounding facility in China.
At Fakuma in 2017, the company initially said it was targeting
2020 for a plant startup in China
but now has pushed that back to
2023 or 2024.
While demand could support
a new facility in China, the company decided it should focus on
supporting the North American
factory, its first outside Turkey,
and make sure it's working before tackling a Chinese investment, Yuksel Habip, global business director.

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Plastics News Daily Report - May 9, 2018