Asia-Pacific ink market development trend in 2003

At present, the Asia-Pacific region has become an important center for ink manufacturing in the world. Industry analysts at Frost & Sullivan, a well-known market research consultancy, estimate that the total ink market in Southeast Asia and Australia is close to 130,000 tons, with an amount exceeding US$500 million. It is worth mentioning that half of the world's top 10 ink companies are headquartered in Japan.

However, it should be pointed out that the development of the ink industry in various countries in the Asia Pacific region is very different. There are countries like China, India, and Vietnam that are developing very fast, and there are also important centers for the printing industry like Japan and Australia. The printing industry in other countries is only just beginning.

Even in countries where the ink industry is growing rapidly, the mainstream printing methods are different, and the speed of radiation curing technology is not the same.

In fact, many countries in the Asia Pacific region have different cultures and beliefs. At present, the Asia Pacific region has become the fastest growing region in the world economy. For European and American ink manufacturers, establishing business operations in the Asia Pacific region is a matter of serious concern.

The 2002 Asia-Pacific Ink Market Review In 2002, when the European and American economies were slowly recovering, the Asia-Pacific economy grew rapidly. In particular, China and India have become the engines driving economic growth in the region.

“The Flint Ink business performed very well in the India/Pacific region in 2002. Sales in the region surpassed plans at the beginning of the year but were also affected by the strengthening of the US dollar in the second half of the year. In 2003, we were confident that we would achieve higher goals.” Flint Ink India/Pacific President Damian Johnson said.

"Overall, there was a marked improvement in the Asia-Pacific region in 2002 compared to 2001. Sakai Inx Co., Ltd.'s International Business Department Managing Director Sakuhisa Kazuo Sakuma said.

However, the growth rate in the region is not as fast as it was in previous years.

“Overall, the Asia Pacific region performed relatively well, at least in growth rather than recession,” said Helmut Unkel, director of HJUnkel China Ltd.

"As a result of the worldwide economic recession, the growth rate of the printing industry in the Asia-Pacific region in 2002 was not as fast as in 2001. Hisato Tanemura, marketing manager of Asia-Pacific Corporation of DIC (Daini Ink Chemical Industry Co., Ltd.), pointed out that the sales volume of  from sales. The growth rate is lower than 3%, but the market conditions are basically flat due to falling prices.The gap between large companies and small companies in the printing industry is widening. Some companies have expanded their businesses by providing value-added services. There are also many printers and distributors. Closed.

Exports in 2002 also declined slightly, so this is also a negative side.

“Before the end of 2002, the ink industry was affected more and more by the decline of exports, although at that time the domestic market was still performing quite well, especially packaging gravure inks. Alexander Sieber, Business Unit Manager, Printing Industry, Clariant Germany Pointed out.

For the printing and ink industries in the Asia Pacific region, the growth rate varies from country to country, and China is the fastest growing country.

“In the Asia-Pacific region, China, South Korea, Malaysia, Vietnam and other countries have high GDP growth rates, especially China, which will continue to grow rapidly in the next five to eight years. Vietnam’s economic growth has already shown signs of abundance. In the next few years, the Vietnamese economy will maintain strong growth, said Mr. Leung Chih-chih, President of Fulin Ink Asia.

"On the other hand, Japan, Taiwan, Indonesia, the Philippines, Hong Kong and other parts of Asia are in a weak economy or recession. Mr. Lou Liangzhi added.

“After China, countries such as India, Indonesia, and Vietnam have achieved very high growth rates, while export-dependent countries such as Malaysia and Singapore have lagged behind. Mr. Kasper said.

“The growth rate of the Chinese ink market is more than 10%, while other countries do not achieve the same growth rate as before.

In Australia and New Zealand, the acquisition of coldset and thermoset businesses in the Siqar Group in the region will give Flint Ink a higher performance.

China has become a hot spot in the world's ink industry With China becoming the fastest growing economy in the Asia Pacific region, major ink manufacturers in the world have made major investment activities in China, such as: Toyo Ink, Sakata Inx, DIC, Flint Ink, and Tung Wah Ink. Wait.

According to reports, DIC Group hopes to increase its share of the Asia-Pacific ink market to 35% in the next five years by increasing production efficiency and building new factories. The company expects to sell 100 billion yen worth of printing inks in the Asia Pacific region in 2010. Currently, DIC Group has a market share of 23% in the Asia-Pacific region. The company regards China and India as the most important markets for its growth goals. In this conception, the Chinese market will maintain a 10% 2-digit growth rate each year before 2010, so the company believes that the Chinese market size may be larger than the Japanese market.

Flint Ink has broken ground in its news ink factory in Beijing. It is currently building on schedule and is expected to be completed by the end of 2003.

Toyo Ink announced that it will invest 5 billion yen (about 345 million yuan) to establish a new sales and manufacturing company in Shanghai Hanjiang Industrial Park - Shanghai Toyo Ink Manufacturing Co., Ltd. The new company will provide packaging materials, including A series of existing Toyo Ink products.

Another Japanese ink giant SakataInx Co., Ltd. also established a subsidiary in Shanghai for ink production and sales. The company's name is Sakata Ink Shanghai Co., Ltd. The registered capital of the company is 600 million yen (approximately 40 million yuan), and construction is planned to start in February 2003. It will be completed and put into production in September. It will mainly produce packaging liquid inks and gravure inks. The planned annual output is 3,600 tons. Sakata Inx Co., Ltd. has also established a mid-term business plan for the period 2004-2006, according to which the company will increase its ink sales in the Asia-Pacific region from 6.7 billion yen in 2003 to 10 billion yen in 2006.

T&K TOKA inks will invest 2.1 billion Yen (approximately 145 million RMB) in the next five years to substantially increase the number of offset printing inks and UV inks for Chinese subsidiaries (Hanghua Ink Chemical Co., Ltd. and Donghua Guangzhou Ink Co., Ltd.) With the production capacity, the completion of this investment will increase the production capacity of Tung Wah Group's Chinese subsidiary by 90% to 30,000 tons per year.

According to industry insiders, the Chinese economy will continue to grow at a rate of 7%-7.5% per annum in the coming years, while the growth rate of China's printing industry will exceed the growth rate of GDP. The annual growth rate of the publishing industry will reach 8%-10%, and the annual growth rate of the packaging industry will reach 12%. The driving force for China’s economic growth is mainly China’s accession to the WTO, urbanization of the rural population, competition and development of the media industry, Prepare for the 2008 Olympic Games.

“At present, the annual output of China's ink industry has reached 250,000 tons, and China has become the world’s fourth largest ink producer, accounting for 6% of the world’s ink production. The total amount of China’s ink market is RMB 5 billion per year. Say.

“In China, the share of offset printing inks is the largest, accounting for 40%-45% of the total market, and the annual growth rate is close to 5%; the demand for letterpress inks is declining, but flexographic inks are still growing at a rate of 5% per year; The ink market remains stable; there is a growing trend for screen printing inks. The demand for alcohol-soluble inks and water-based inks will increase rapidly,” continued Mr. Weng Kaier. "Perhaps China's fastest-growing ink sector is inkjet inks and various offset inks. The growth from ordinary news inks to high-gloss single-sheet or cold-set web offset inks is very rapid."

Chinese officials stressed the need to develop high-end packaging products, increase the added value of products and meet the needs of the domestic market and exports. Therefore, the printing industry must consolidate and develop the existing offset printing production capacity, improve gravure printing, screen printing, inkjet printing, and curve surface printing capabilities, develop flexo printing, and improve post-press processing technologies.

It is worth noting that compared with gravure, flexo printing has developed rapidly in China. In the beer label market, Flexo has already occupied nearly 10% of the market share. Tianjin Toyo Ink Co., Ltd., Shaanxi New Century Printing Materials Co., Ltd., and Jinan Luyang Ink Chemical Co., Ltd. have developed a large number of production of flexo printing ink products and flexographic UV Varnish and auxiliary materials series. The quality is basically stable, and it can be used for high-grade color screen flexo printing.

The beer industry in China has developed rapidly. In 2000, China’s beer production exceeded 22 million tons, 25% more than in 1999. Beer production was 22.7 million tons in 2001, beer production reached 23.86 million tons in 2002, surpassing the United States for the first time to become the world’s number one beer. Big country of production. The fast-growing beer industry has brought about rapid growth of beer label printing. In 2000, the label printing requirements for beer bottles and bottle necks reached 34 billion, while the label printing demand for beer bottles reached 7 billion. 30% of Tsingtao beer uses bottle cap labels, and the development of aluminum foil bottle labels is also very high. rapid.

The share of solvent-based inks in the market for beer label printing exceeds 50%, and the combined market share of water-based inks and UV inks approaches 38%. In the printing of beer labels, gravure still accounted for 46%, offset 35%, and flexo 12%.

In addition, flexographic inks are also used to print corrugated boxes, plastic flexible packaging and adhesive tapes. International ink company and domestic large companies also develop and sell high-grade narrow-format inks. In terms of prices, the prices of national products are lower than those of imported products. Hanghua Ink, Shaanxi New Century Printing Materials, Akzo Noble Ink (Guangzhou) Co., Ltd., and Beijing Iris Ink Co., Ltd. are the main suppliers of label printing flexo inks.

At present, the quality of water-based inks for paper and aluminum foil labels in China is close to that of foreign products, and the quality of some products can even be comparable to foreign products. Zhu Meisheng, general manager of Shaanxi New Century Printing Materials Co., Ltd. thinks this way.

Xi'an 3D Printing Co., Ltd. is a narrow-width flexographic printing company. Currently, 60% of its ink is supplied by Shaanxi New Century Printing Materials Co., Ltd., and the other 40% of ink is supplied by AkzoNobel Ink (Guangzhou) Co., Ltd.

At present, China's ink industry should strengthen the study of pigments, resin emulsions and additives used in waterborne flexographic inks. At the same time, it should formulate national standards and industry standards for water-based inks, Zhu Meisheng added.

In China, environmental issues are becoming increasingly important and printers are interested in green inks. “Our sheet-fed environmental protection inks have seen a significant increase in exports to China. Mr. Toshihisa Satoh said.

Japan's ink industry has 5 of the world's top 10 ink manufacturers headquartered in Japan, and Tokyo-based DIC Group, the world's largest ink company (Dainippon Ink & Chemicals, Inc.), had sales of $3.8 billion in 2002. The remaining four companies are: Toyo Ink Manufacturing Co., Ltd., Tokyo Ink Co., Ltd., Sakata Inx Co., Ltd. and Inctec Co., Ltd.

Due to the weak economy in Japan, the domestic ink market has also been weak. "SakataInx's sales in the Japanese market have increased slightly but prices have dropped. Mr. Sasaki Inagaki said.

The price of the Japanese ink market has been declining over the past few years. The increasingly thin profits have made it increasingly difficult for small companies in the industry to operate, and digital technologies have grown rapidly.

Due to the small potential of the Japanese ink market, companies such as DIC, Toyo Ink and Sakata Inx have intensified their expansion in other important Asian markets, especially China.

The latest trend in the Asia-Pacific ink market The common phenomenon in the Asia-Pacific ink market is that despite the increase in raw material prices, the industry is highly competitive.

With the liberalization of ASEAN regional markets, competition in the Southeast Asian market will intensify. As tariffs on products imported from China, Taiwan and South Korea to ASEAN will decline, more manufacturers will enter ASEAN and cause prices to fall. In addition, due to the lack of effective restrictions on environmental regulations, cheap common solvent-based inks are still in the country