ASC: Introduction – Poised for growth through innovation

Joe Kamalick

23-Oct-2014

ASC’s Fall Convention will highlight the huge potential of the adhesive and sealant market

As some 600 executives gather in Greenville, South Carolina, for the Adhesive and Sealant Council’s (ASC’s) Fall Convention, the industry is facing broad potential for market expansion, driven in part by multiple innovations among producers, formulators and downstream customers.

It is that spirit and practice of innovation that drives the ASC, its policies and programmes, says chairman Rusty Thompson.

“Innovation is the new tagline for the ASC,” Thompson says. “We want ‘innovate’ to be the first word in adhesives and we want to be the purveyor of innovation though the use of adhesives. Finding new ways to utilise adhesives and sealants is the goal, whether in light-weighting automobiles or making packaging more recyclable.”

Innovation in adhesives is enabling them to replace conventional welding methods

Copyright: Rex Features

The ASC board of directors approved the new campaign on innovation, community knowledge, education and industry voice at their meeting in April at the Spring Convention, held in Orlando, Florida.

Innovation will drive much of what ASC members will see at the Fall Convention and EXPO. ASC president Matt Croson says the Greenville conference will explore innovation and new applications potential in four main areas: transportation, facility construction, packaging and assembly.

LIGHT-WEIGHTING EFFORTS
In transportation, Croson says, “The major trend now without doubt is on light-weighting of materials, specifically to address the Obama administration’s objective of achieving an average 50 miles per gallon for vehicles over the next few years.

“So, there is a tremendous amount of innovation underway in this market space, with automakers leveraging the adhesives community in different ways to light-weight vehicles even more with new materials.”

Croson notes that US and other automakers made great strides in reducing vehicle weight by switching from steel to aluminium in every possible component. “Aluminium is light and strong. Trouble is, it can’t be welded, but it can be glued and that’s where adhesives step in,” he says.

“So you’re going to see more and more glue instead of welds to join pieces in auto mainframes, door frames, all over in newer vehicles,” he adds, noting that automakers are enlisting ASC members to figure out where more adhesives can be used instead of welds or rivets.

The same is true in another major segment of the transportation sector – aviation. “A lot of the newer commercial aircraft, like the Boeing 777, involve carbon [fibre-reinforced] materials, but there also are a lot of high-performance adhesives involved in enabling the ability to bond those major transportation structures together,” Croson says.

While packaging accounts for the lion’s share of the US adhesives and sealants market at 55%, facility construction holds a solid second place at 20% and it is here that convention participants will see even more innovation and new application prospects.

PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE
Many of the seminars at the Fall Convention, says Croson, will focus on the design climate for facility construction. For example, architects will outline what they will need and require in future building design and construction.

There will also be presentations by government and academic engineering specialists, “so that attendees at the convention can learn from customers, government and other technical people on important trends impacting the design climate”, he says.

In packaging, Croson points out that the aging US population is in part driving innovation as the “Baby Boomer” generation – born in 1946-1964 – moves into retirement in ever greater numbers.

“Older people favour packaging that is easy to open, easy to reseal and yet is certain to keep products fresh,” he says. As the population ages, Croson says, that trend is supportive of the increasing use of adhesives.

CONSUMER PACKAGING DEVELOPMENT
Innovation and conservation also drive packaging developments at the consumer level, notes Croson, who cites a new adhesive by Germany’s Henkel that binds the two cardboard layers of a hot liquids cup holder so that it expands when near heat.

The slight adhesive expansion between the two layers of cardboard provides further insulation and better protection for the hand, while reducing the amount of cardboard used by 25%.

He sees even more market growth potential in the assembly sector, with adhesives and sealants riding the rising wave of personal electronic products and expansion in the solar and wind energy industries.

“We expect continuing growth in volume, but also through the wider use of dual-­purpose adhesives,” he says, “such as electrically conductive adhesives that could enable how the device operates, allowing a signal to pass between two components without wiring.”

Another convention seminar will feature researchers in various fields discussing what they are working on that might be ready for production in five or 10 years.

“Innovation is our touchstone now,” Croson says. “What we’re doing is to foster and support innovation among our members, and the long-range plan is to accelerate innovation across the entire adhesives and sealants chain.”

Croson says that the EXPO at the Fall Convention has been expanded to ensure that “we have the right supply chain partners for manufacturers to leverage”. The Greenville EXPO will feature as many as 75 companies representing various parts of the supply chain.

“This is where you find innovation,” Croson says. “Your customer helps you innovate, you innovate through your own R&D and raw materials producers will come up with something to share.

“Our first step is to make sure that the EXPO and speakers in the convention are from the supply chain that matters and that we are dealing with new things and that we are offering that 
connection.”

The Fall Convention will be the last for Rusty Thompson as ASC chairman and he is keen to ensure that the long term three-year growth plan approved by the board is sustained. Thompson’s day job is president of Evans Adhesives.

“I want to secure the next two years, to maintain the momentum that we’ve built over the last five years towards increased participation for our members,” he says.

LONG-TERM VISION
“I want to see continued support for the three-year plan and, in meeting those short-term mile markers, to make sure that things are moving forward,” he says. “We want to see people getting on the ­bandwagon and supporting the plan to the Nth degree.”

“I think we have put forth specific initiatives to address each of those goals,” he says, referring to the four horsemen of innovation, education, community knowledge and industry voice.

On the education side, Croson notes that ASC has added two new market reports, including an analysis of Central and South America and a detailed study on pressure sensitive adhesives (PSAs) in North America. Those reports join the longstanding market reviews on North America and Asia.

Others will appear in pairs over the next couple of years, with Urethanes in North America and Caulks & Sealants in North America to debut in 2015.

Another education initiative, says Thompson, is a new undertaking in training certifications, which is what he describes as a series of courses that would parallel the sort of determinations delivered in ISO training and standards. “We’re just getting started on this and it might be ready by January,” Thompson says.

The goal is to certify ASC member companies and their staff as industry experts, building greater credibility for them in the marketplace and in front of customers.

The graduate-level courses, he says, “will be of value to someone who is brand new to the industry, as well as those who have 10 or 20 years in the industry and allow those who are senior in the industry to bring more value to the membership”.

WASHINGTON FLY-IN
He says that ASC took a major step in advancing the adhesives and sealants industry voice by participating earlier this year in the Washington, DC, fly-in organised by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM).

Thompson and four other industry executives took part in what he described as groundbreaking exposure for ASC among top federal policymakers.

“We had unbelievable access to senators and House members, including Mitch 
McConnell,” the Republican minority leader in the Senate, “and vice president Joe Biden. We also were able to meet with other key senators and representatives to talk about the TSCA reform, delays in interstate infrastructure improvements and other issues,” Thompson says, referring to long-overdue changes needed for the Toxic Substances Control Act.

“I was impressed with the accessibility that NAM was able to set up for us,” he says, “and I think this should be an annual event for us. It certainly is something we need to continue for adhesives.”

Also at the Fall Convention, ASC officials will be discussing the potential for an adhesives and sealants public relations campaign, possibly to be aimed at customers, the design industry and others – perhaps something like the widely seen “Got Milk?” campaign, although aimed at the business community rather than consumers.

“We have set things in motion, funded projects and initiatives to meet our goals,” Thompson says, “and now we’re waiting to see the results of those investments and determine if we’re getting the returns we expect to get.”

“Some of these are still in their infancy, but we’re watching them grow and we’re ready to address any issues that may crop up that we didn’t anticipate.”

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