Chinaplas to unveil more industrial trends; highlights three concurrent events

Chinaplas’s exciting concurrent events, in which industrial giants share their experiences and attendees gain insights into industrial trends, have always been the highlight of the trade fair, and well received by exhibitors and visitors alike.

Chinaplas 2017 to be held in Guangzhou from May 16 -19 will gather more than 3,300 exhibitors who will introduce innovative solutions for the plastics and rubber industries. Its organiser, Adsale Exhibition Services Ltd, will hold concurrent events: the “2ndIndustry 4.0 Conference”, the “Design x Innovation”, and the “3rd Medical Plastics Conference”, all heralding the theme of “Intelligent Manufacturing, High-tech Materials, Green Solutions”.Visitors can expect more cutting-edge technologies and inspiring case studies in these events, allowing them to better understand market dynamics from multiple dimensions, explore more valuable opportunities for collaborations and wider networks to facilitate development.

Industry 4.0, a prime focus

China has quickly become the world’s second largest national economy, and labour costs have risen sharply. It is no longer a low-wage cost country – all kinds of cost pressures force businesses to opt for more automation equipment and advanced technology in the production processes.

According to Stanley Chu, Chairman of Adsale, China is still a developing country, and has yet to fulfil the necessary conditions for industrial 4.0.

“Only a few companies are making use of networking production technologies. Industry 4.0 is still a vision for many Chinese companies, yet an attainable one, and is attainable in the foreseeable future, if it is desired that something be done to cope with cost pressures.”

This year’s show, the 2nd Industry 4.0 Conference, with the support from VDMA (the German Engineering Federation), will be held in the afternoon of May 16; in the morning of May 17; and in the afternoon of May 18, respectively at the Conference Room 1, Level C, Zone B, China Import & Export Fair Complex, Pazhou. As a “signature dish” dedicated to visitors, the conference will provide practical and operational solutions for enterprises targeting urgent manufacturing upgrade. Industry 4.0 will eventually move towards the direction of customised, small batch production, which are also the characteristics of additive manufacturing (3D printing) technology that meet the demands for the development of more personalised products. This is the long-term goal of Industry 4.0.

At the 1^st edition of Industry 4.0 Conference, German machine construction company, Arburg, introduced the technology of additive manufacturing. This will be presented again at this year’s edition. According to Adsale, the Industry 4.0 Conference held last year not only brought together world renowned enterprises such as Arburg, KraussMaffei, Engel, Wittmann Battenfeld, Beckhoff, Volkswagen AG, Haier, and SAP to give presentations, but also attracted nearly 600 local and overseas professionals, who were generally satisfied, and looked forward to more case studies of Industry 4.0, which, combined with their own businesses, would promote the intelligentisation of their factories, enhancing production efficiency, improving product quality and achieving lean production status.

“The Industry 4.0 Conference was well received by members of the Association, and the delegates agreed that there were quite some useful details,” commented the Anhui Plastics Industry Association. “We realised that Industry 4.0 is not an achievement overnight, but systems engineering of long-term hard work and perseverance in integrating theory and practice.”

Furthermore, the Smart Manufacturing Technology Zone, a showcase of cutting-edgeautomation technologies, will provide a boost to the movement from “Made in China” to “Smartly Made in China.”

“Design x Innovation” enlightens the upstream and downstream sectors

Since its inception, “Design x Innovation” has attracted a lot of attention. As visitors’ needs get more sophisticated, the event itself gets more vibrant – “Innovation Gallery”, “Open Forum”, “Meet the Designers” are the programmes, which introduce success stories of innovative industrial designs to visitors, who gain inspirations on application of new materials and at the same time discuss and exchange solutions face-to-face, further creating value.

At the “Design x Innovation” event in 2016, the “Innovation Gallery” showcased a wide range of creative products for use in everyday life, for example, in the stadium, and at transportation hubs, among which the e-floater received great attention. This solar-powered electric scooter could help solve the “Last Mile” problem when applied to short-distance travel in the city. 80% of its materials come from Germany’s BASF composites and plastics, thereby reducing weight and increasing flexibility in design.

On the other hand, innovative products such as Elastopave permeable pavement, Running track with ETPU+EPDM composite, artificial turf, air fryer, Volvo integrated leather PU engine sound absorbing decorative covering and other innovative products have left visitors deeply impressed.

In addition, nearly 400 professionals also participated in five “Open Forum” sessions, “tasting” the “delicious chicken soup” prepared by 16 “heavyweight” speakers.

“Plastics, especially new materials, continue to emerge, providing enormous help to the designing process,” remarked one of the speakers, Lian Zhen, General Manager of LKK Design Co, Ltd, Shanghai, in an interview after his presentation.

“During its many years of development, plastics have been inspiring and providing anincreasing number of possibilities of designs, including innovations in the upstream and downstream industries, which focus on plastics and injection, and have enriched our imagination, realising creative ideas that once could only be dreamt but not tried.”

“The ‘Design x Innovation’ open forum is a relatively new format, allowing exchanges between creative designers and technical personnel, through which different sectors manage to understand each other's needs and demands, and leads to better co-operation. I learned a lot from them.”

“Meet the Designers” provided more opportunities for interaction and cooperation between industrial designers and end-users. Many acclaimed designers were present. Experienced industrial designers and user enterprises looking for product design came into direct communication, enlightening each other, answering questions and discussing cooperation possibilities concerning product designs. What wonders is “Design x innovation” 2017 going to bring to the industry? Stay tuned!

3^rd Medical Plastics Conference helps hunters uncover treasures from this sunrise industry

The growing demand for medical devices by the huge population in recent years, the rise of emerging markets and the ageing society is triggering a renewed growth of the medical device market.

China’s healthcare industry is at a stage of abundant potentials, but is at the same time having a low level of technology, prompting manufacturers to find adaptive solutions to existing production lines and cost pressures. New and better materials are the key to the future development of medical enterprises.

The concurrent event Medical Plastics Conference has been held successfully in the past two years, receiving very positive feedbacks from the industry. “At the Medical Plastics Conference, the technical experts shared the state-of-the-art technology of the industry and analysed development direction of medical applications and solutions,” praised Shanghai Medical Device Industry Association. “At the same time,processing technology related to the production of precision medical polymer was introduced, offering enterprises knowledge of new materials and direction of development.”

The two-day 2^nd Medical Plastics Conference attracted 600 professional visitors. Topics covered: the latest medical polymer materials, 3D printing in clinical and surgical model applications, medical laws and regulations, as well as application of surgical models. For instance, Shanghai MicroPort Medical (Group) Co., Ltd. introduced the technology of precision medical polymer tube for invasive medical device, and Wego Holding Co, Ltd. explained the opportunities and challenges of biomedical polymers development in China under the “new normal”. Attendees included delegates from 3M China, GE Medical, Poppelmann, UEG medical, Touren, GM, Renolit, Suzhou Baxter medical and other major enterprises.

This year, the 3^rd edition of the Medical Plastics Conference, to be held in the afternoon of May 17 and in the morning of May 18, 2017 in Conference Room 1, Level C, Zone B, will bring together the upstream and downstream sectors of the industry to discuss the latest applications of medical plastics and cutting-edge production technology.

The conference will also be concurrent with a showcase gallery which focuses on exhibitors’ medical products of all types in order to help visitors quickly spot their targets among the massive amount exhibits.

Chinaplas 2017 will be held at the China Import & Export Fair Complex, Pazhou, Guangzhou, PR China on May 16 – 19, 2017. The admission fee is RMB 30 (one day pass) and RMB 50 (four-day pass). To enjoy free admission, please visit www.ChinaplasOnline.com/prereg to pre-register before May 9, 2017. Visitors successfully pre-register before March 1, 2017 will receive the visitor badge by mail in advance.

For further details, please visit the official show website at www.ChinaplasOnline.com

(PRA)