PEB Steel new factory in Vietnam, RPM's slow sales in Q2, Goodlass Nerolac Paints's investment plans
SpecialChem |
Mark Drukenbrod
- Dec 29, 2005
Hello and welcome to your late week international coatings
industry update from PaintandCoatings.com. We have some interesting news and
technology for this issue, so let me get right to it.
Our first item comes from Vietnam, where pre-engineered steel building manufacturer
PEB Steel plans to invest US$1 million in a factory to produce water-proofing
paint in the second quarter of next year. The company has anticipated that demand
for the membrane product will be higher in the future, general director Sami
Nour Kteily said.
It has won five deals to coat 35,000 square meters of roof since it started
supplying the Top Seal paint produced by United Coatings in the country in June.
RPM International this week said that earnings for its fiscal 2006 second quarter
will be below the prior year as a result of the US Gulf coast hurricanes, slower
sales growth and higher raw material costs. The company expects second quarter
2006 diluted earnings per share of $0.22 - $0.24 versus year-ago EPS of $0.31,
both prior to charges related to asbestos liabilities.
In Malaysia, Goodlass Nerolac Paints plans to invest up to RM1.13 billion in
a partnership with its parent company to capture a slice of the home paint market.
GNP has formed a joint-venture company with Japan's Kansai Paints Co Ltd, which
fully owns the Indian firm.
Goodlass vice-president for special projects and head of corporate communications,
Ashok Saini, said that the joint-venture firm has agreed to buy the paint business
of Sime Coatings Sdn Bhd. Kansai Paints also has a stake in a Malaysian automotive
coating firm, Sime Kansai Paints Sdn Bhd.
Sime Coatings, formerly called PAR, was founded in 1958. It was renamed Sime
Coatings in 1999, reflecting the ownership by Sime Darby Bhd. It is the largest
manufacturer of automotive original equipment manufacturer coatings in Malaysia.
Sime's coating division consists of Sime Coatings, Sime Kansai Paints and Wuxi
PAR Resources Coatings and Chemicals Co. It has established technical tie-ups
with various paint manufacturers in the world.
In the same way that the opposite sex seems to become more attractive after
starting to wear a wedding ring, there is news in the Wattyl matter in Australia.
Allco Equity Partners may have a battle on its hands for control of Wattyl after
Barloworld, a South African group that also owns several paint brands in Australia,
signaled its interest in the manufacturer. Get the details where our editorial
continues. Also, we take a look at a new technology that could open coatings
to new markets. The materials themselves are called metallic glasses.
Barloworld this week announced that it has appointed ANZ Bank
to advise it on a takeover offer for Wattyl.
In Australia, Dulux is the leading player with 38% of the domestic market.
Wattyl is the No2 player, ahead of the Barloworld's Taubmans brand.
"We are a major player in the market and there is a bid on the table for
Wattyl," said Garth Smart, the managing director of Barloworld Coatings
Australia. "We have to look at the alternatives." Smart then said
it would be "going too far" to assume that it was considering a counter-bid.
Barloworld, which also owns the Bristol and White Knight brands, has appointed
ANZ Bank to review the terms of the Allco proposal and advice on a range of
alternatives.
Mr. Smart said Barloworld expected to complete its considerations in early February.
But he declined to discuss what the alternatives might be, adding that he could
not say more than what was in the brief statement.
Interestingly, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission rejected
an attempt to merge Wattyl with Taubmans in 1995. Doing the math shows that
they would control 56% of the Australian paint market together.
What Eisenhower called the "military-industrial complex" is a hotbed
of material development in the US, and a new one came to light last week. This
is just a mention to get metallic glasses on your radar screen.
Dr. Daniel B. Miracle has been working on research leading to the discovery
of the atomic structure of metallic glasses. His research provides a new paradigm
for the structure of condensed solids, and a new approach to efficient filling
of space.
The advancements, spearheaded by Dr. Miracle and the AFRL Materials and Manufacturing
Directorate Metals, Ceramics and Nondestructive Evaluation Division, will enable
development of stronger, high performance aerospace components. Metallic glasses
are important because they can greatly reduce structural mass in aircraft and
high mach air vehicles and provide more affordable access to space.
In science, glass is defined as any material that can go from liquid state
to solid state without crystallizing. Most metals in liquid state crystallize
as they cool, and their atoms settle into highly regular spatial patterns known
as "lattices." Metallic glass forms when crystallization does not
occur. Instead, the atoms settle into random or "amorphous" arrangements.
Ordinary window glass, although not metallic, possesses one type of amorphous
atomic arrangement.
Metallic glasses are not transparent like window glass; however, they do have
remarkable mechanical and magnetic properties, such as the exceptional ability
to spring back into their original shape after being acted upon by an outside
force. Conventional metals, by comparison, can be bent out of shape, and stay
that way indefinitely, because their crystal lattices are loaded with defects.
Metallic glasses have specific strengths twice that of compositionally similar
crystalline alloys, valuable magnetic characteristics, exceptional corrosion
resistance, and outstanding wear resistance. Combined, these properties make
metallic glasses excellent engineering solutions for important technology applications
such as low loss power transformer cores, corrosion-resistant coatings for nuclear
containment, and structural hinges with infinite fatigue life for digital mirror
devices.
A principle objective of Dr. Miracle's work has been to provide a fundamental
understanding of the features that influence the stability of metallic glasses,
so that a quantitative ability to predict and design new bulk metallic glasses
is established. While topology provides a dominant influence, chemical contributions
are also known to be important in the stability of metallic glasses. Thus, the
topological model cannot fully explain the stability and hence, the constitution
of metallic glasses to the desired level of accuracy. Efforts are underway to
establish a quantitative description of the chemical influence via collaboration
with scientists from Johns-Hopkins University, The Ohio State University, and
the University of Sydney (Australia), and atomistic simulations are being pursued
where the chemical contributions can be adjusted independently of topological
(size) effects.
Researchers anticipate that a fully predictive model for new metallic glasses
will emerge, once the chemical contribution to metallic glass stability is better
understood.
In other news, Fuji Photo Film Co., Ltd. announced that it
has concluded a contract to acquire the Avecia Group's Inkjet business, headquartered
in Manchester, England, a leading global player in production and sales of dyes
and inks for inkjet printers ...more
about this news
Celanese Emulsions, a business of Celanese Chemicals, announced
a new agent and distributor for its Celanese Mowilith and Vinamul polymer emulsions
in Poland ...more
about this news
And finally, effective February 15, 2006 the business line
Goldschmidt Industrial Specialties of Degussa AG will increase prices in Europe
by 5 to 11 percent for specialty surfactants in industrial applications ...more
about this news
Thank you for reading and using PaintandCoatings.com.
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