News
News
John C Miller, President DuPont Teijin Films Europe
John C Miller, President DuPont Teijin Films Europe, reports on how the recession affected his business and how the company has come through the worst of times in a stronger position to deliver polyester film solutions for the demands of tomorrow.
"Although all our energies are now focused on managing and taking the business forward, it is right for me to take time and reflect on what has been a most extraordinary period in the history for our industry.
Polyester films are an integral part of so many industrial and consumer products, servicing markets as broad as consumer electronics, advertising, healthcare, food packaging and many more. This very diversity of applications film has been the driving force behind the continued growth of the polyester film market., a market which carried on growing despite the collapse of its one time major market application, video tapes. Nothing seemed able to shake the polyester film market. That was until October 2008.
Within our European business, up to September, 2008 had been a very positive year with full order books and manufacturing at full capacity. We then started to see orders fall away for our specialist products we supply directly to Asia. By November many of our European customers were reducing or cancelling their orders. By December it was clear that the recession was hitting manufacturing to a far greater extent than either we had seen before or the economic commentators were reporting.
As everyone focused on 'cash' as their number 1 priority, stocks in the supply chains were reduced to minimum levels and our order books hit an all time low in March. We too of course focused on reducing stock and minimising all non essential expenditure.
By May, we started to see some recovery, a recovery that has been maintained, month on month, to the point where demand is stretching our ability to supply. We, like our customers, were tested through this period. We learnt much about ourselves, how to reduce waste and become more efficient and I genuinely believe, we have come in to 2010 a stronger business as a result of our experiences.
Looking to 2010, the big question for everyone is whether the recovery is sustainable. We have seen an extraordinary bounce back in demand, which in part must be due to the stock pipe line filling. Will it be sustained ? Forecasting is a difficult art, but we are cautiously optimistic. Our customers are talking to us positively about the future and we have exciting new developments aimed at helping address existing problems, but also addressing future needs.
At DuPont Teijin Films in Europe, we recognise our heritage and our on going strength is speedily bringing innovative new products to the diverse market for today's applications and using our skills to work with partners to find polyester film solutions for tomorrow's new applications and products. We are totally committed to our vision of bringing high quality innovated products to our markets, something we believe we are in a better position to after our 'learning' of how to do business through the recent turbulence. We have the skilled people and the manufacturing assets necessary to continue to be the market leader, something we are determined to maintain.
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