CHICAGO — Auxiliary equipment manufacturer Colortronic Inc. has reorganized its business into two units, to provide better service for its U.S. extrusion and injection molding customers.
``We have to specialize,'' said Marcel Rohr, president and chief executive officer of Colortronic GmbH of Friedrichsdorf, Germany.
By separating its extrusion and injection molding efforts, the firm will be more effective in the plastics equipment market, said Rohr, who heads the investment group that acquired Colortronic from K-Tron International in 1995.
At a June 17 news conference at NPE 1997 in Chicago, Rohr said Colortronic's extrusion side of the business experienced 100 percent growth during the past year. The company employs 200 worldwide and has sales of $45 million, according to Rohr.
Rohr, who said Colortronic has a 28 percent market share in Germany and 20 percent in the rest of Europe, is looking to the Far East and South America as potential growth areas for the firm.
``Italy and England are slowly developing markets,'' he said.
But he said the firm also is committed to building a bigger presence in the U.S. market from its Blackwood, N.J.-based subsidiary, Colortronic Inc. That unit, which employs 20, is headed by Robert Edwards, executive vice president and chief executive officer.
``We'll do a lot of investing here in the [United] States,'' Rohr said.
``NPE is one of the most important shows in the world for us,'' he added.
Rohr pointed out that 35-40 percent of the equipment sales leads Colortronic gets at the large Chicago exhibition are international.