Skip to main content
Sister Publication Links
  • Sustainable Plastics
  • Rubber News
Subscribe
  • Sign Up Free
  • Login
  • Subscribe
  • News
    • Processor News
    • Suppliers
    • More News
    • Digital Edition
    • End Markets
    • Special Reports
    • Newsletters
    • Resin pricing news
    • Videos
    • Injection Molding
    • Blow Molding
    • Film & Sheet
    • Pipe/Profile/Tubing
    • Rotomolding
    • Thermoforming
    • Recycling
    • Machinery
    • Materials
    • Molds/Tooling
    • Product news
    • Design
    • K Show
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Sustainability
    • Public Policy
    • Material Insights Videos
    • Numbers that Matter
    • Automotive
    • Packaging
    • Medical
    • Consumer Products
    • Construction
    • Processor of the Year
    • Best Places to Work
    • Women Breaking the Mold
    • Rising Stars
    • Diversity
    • Most Interesting Social Media Accounts in Plastics
  • Opinion
    • The Plastics Blog
    • Kickstart
    • One Good Resin
    • Pellets and Politics
    • All Things Data
    • Viewpoint
    • From Pillar to Post
    • Perspective
    • Mailbag
    • Fake Plastic Trees
  • Shop Floor
    • Blending
    • Compounding
    • Drying
    • Injection Molding
    • Purging
    • Robotics
    • Size Reduction
    • Structural Foam
    • Tooling
    • Training
  • Events
    • K Show Livestream
    • Plastics News Events
    • Industry Events
    • Injection Molding & Design Expo
    • Livestreams/Webinars
    • Editorial Livestreams
    • Ask the Expert
    • Plastics News Events Library
    • Processor of the Year submissions
    • Plastics News Executive Forum
    • Injection Molding & Design Expo
    • Plastics News Caps & Closures
    • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum
    • Plastics in Automotive
    • PN Live: Mergers and Acquisitions
    • Polymer Points Live
    • Numbers that Matter Live
    • Plastics in Politics Live
    • Sustainable Plastics Live
    • Plastics Caps & Closures Library
    • Plastics in Healthcare Library
    • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum Library
  • Rankings & Data
    • Injection Molders
    • Blow Molders
    • Film Sheet
    • Thermoformers
    • Pipe Profile Tubing
    • Rotomolders
    • Mold/Toolmakers
    • LSR Processors
    • Recyclers
    • Compounders - List
    • Association - List
    • Plastic Lumber - List
    • All
  • Directory
  • Resin Prices
    • Commodity TPs
    • High Temp TPs
    • ETPs
    • Thermosets
    • Recycled Plastics
    • Historic Commodity Thermoplastics
    • Historic High Temp Thermoplastics
    • Historic Engineering Thermoplastics
    • Historic Thermosets
    • Historic Recycled Plastics
  • Custom
    • Sponsored Content
    • LS Mtron Sponsored Content
    • Conair Sponsored Content
    • KraussMaffei Sponsored Content
    • ENGEL Sponsored Content
    • White Papers
    • Classifieds
    • Place an Ad
    • Sign up for Early Classified
MENU
Breadcrumb
  1. Home
  2. News
December 07, 2017 01:00 AM

Borch targets Mexico for growth

Steve Toloken
Assistant Managing Editor
  • Tweet
  • Share
  • Share
  • Email
  • More
    Reprints Print
    Plastics News photo by Michael A. Marcotte
    From left: Hans Chen, president of Borche Import and Export Inc.; Kangjian Zhu, chairman of Borch Machinery Co. Ltd.; and Emily Ma, overseas business director at Borch Machinery Co. Ltd., at Plastimagen.

    Mexico City — Chinese injection machine maker Guangzhou Borch Machinery Co. Ltd. sees opportunities in Mexico: It opened two new offices and a warehouse in the country last year.

    But the company, which is one of China's largest injection machine makers, also said the factories of its customers in Mexico have grown more cautious about capital spending this year, uncertain about what will happen with the North American Free Trade Agreement and presidential elections next year in Mexico.

    Borch brought two machines to the show floor at Plastimagen, a two-platen 600-ton model in its BU series and a 150-ton high-speed machine in its BH series.

    At the show, it also presented its capabilities in networked, or cloud-connected, manufacturing equipment, a major push for the company, which is opening a new manufacturing plant in southern China early next year to focus on selling more advanced manufacturing lines.

    More immediately in Mexico, the company said it's been in a building mode since launching in the market four years ago.

    “From our experience in the past two years, the Mexican market increased a lot. But this year, it's a little bit … just keeping the same because of some policies from the USA,” said Emily Ma, head of overseas sales at the company's Guangzhou, China, headquarters.

    Hans Chen, president of the company's Ontario, Calif.-based Borche Import and Export Inc. subsidiary, said the Trump administration's NAFTA positions have some companies waiting. (The Chinese parent spells its English name Borch, while the North American subsidiary uses Borche.)

    “Because Donald Trump discusses about NAFTA, a lot of Mexican customers are afraid to invest a lot of money. And they really hesitate about it,” Chen said. “And next year, there's an election in Mexico. So they hesitate again.”

    The company still sees underlying good demand in the market, particularly from the country's auto manufacturing sector.

    It's one of the reasons why the company's chairman, Kangjian Zhu, and Ma made their first trips to Plastimagen this year and why the firm has built a service team of 14 employees in the country.

    The company sells about 50 molding machines a year in Mexico and another 150 or so in the United States and Canada.

    “The Mexico market is really growing every year because a lot of the carmakers move into Mexico,” Chen said.

    The 200 or so machines it sells a year in North America is a small fraction of the 4,000 to 5,000 molding machines the company produces annually at its factories in China, but it's a market the company will be increasingly focusing on, Zhu said.

    He said the BU model on the show floor is an example of the two-platen machines that are in demand in North America.

    “This will really match the request in the North American market for bigger machines,” Zhu said.

    The company's new 270,000-square-foot manufacturing plant in Guangzhou will make the BU machines and focus on making more automated, internet-linked manufacturing systems, Chen said.

    That new plant is set to open early next year, and besides being more automated in how Borch manufactures its own equipment, it will focus on providing customers manufacturing systems, rather than just molding machines.

    “We provide the whole system,” said Chen. “If our customers buy our intelligent machines, and the automation systems, originally, they may need 10 people, now they probably need two or three.”

    Chen said the company is pushing to develop what it calls more intelligent and automated manufacturing equipment, to prepare for more automated factories for its customer industries.

    “A lot of carmakers, when you walk into Tesla, for example, you only see the robot machines; you don't see any people,” Chen said.

    Zhu, who is a senior officer at the China Plastics Machinery Industry Association, has consistently advocated for more automation and cloud-connected Industry 4.0 technology in China's plastics industry.

    In a speech at the Chinaplas trade fair in Shanghai last year, he called for an innovation center to help the Chinese plastics industry develop those technologies. In the Plastimagen interview, he said that he's still working on that. In Shanghai, he described plastics machinery as a “sunrise industry” that should seek more support from government.

    Privately owned Borch, with $150 million in annual sales, is among China's five largest injection machine makers.

    Zhu said Borch has general plans to put a customer service and research center in North American but declined to share details.

    RECOMMENDED FOR YOU
    Georgia home to new PET chemical recycling plant
    Letter
    to the
    Editor

    Do you have an opinion about this story? Do you have some thoughts you'd like to share with our readers? Plastics News would love to hear from you. Email your letter to Editor at [email protected]

    Most Popular
    1
    Tornadoes, severe weather impact Texas resin plants
    2
    Dow cutting 2,000 jobs, ‘evaluating ... global asset base'
    3
    Guilty plea in scheme involving $4.1M in fraudulent polymer sales
    4
    MAPP survey shows ‘struggling' plastics processing sector
    5
    Plastics firms work to eliminate PFAS use as pressure mounts
    SIGN UP FOR OUR FREE NEWSLETTERS
    EMAIL ADDRESS

    Please enter a valid email address.

    Please enter your email address.

    Please verify captcha.

    Please select at least one newsletter to subscribe.

    Get our newsletters

    Staying current is easy with Plastics News delivered straight to your inbox, free of charge.

    Subscribe today

    Subscribe to Plastics News

    Subscribe now
    Connect with Us
    • LinkedIn
    • Facebook
    • Twitter
    • Instagram

    Plastics News covers the business of the global plastics industry. We report news, gather data and deliver timely information that provides our readers with a competitive advantage.

    Contact Us

    1155 Gratiot Avenue
    Detroit MI 48207-2997

    Customer Service:
    877-320-1723

    Resources
    • About
    • Staff
    • Editorial Calendar
    • Media Kit
    • Data Store
    • Digital Edition
    • Custom Content
    • People
    • Contact
    • Careers
    • Sitemap
    Related Crain Publications
    • Sustainable Plastics
    • Rubber News
    • Tire Business
    • Urethanes Technology
    Legal
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • Privacy Request
    Copyright © 1996-2023. Crain Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
    • News
      • Processor News
        • Injection Molding
        • Blow Molding
        • Film & Sheet
        • Pipe/Profile/Tubing
        • Rotomolding
        • Thermoforming
        • Recycling
      • Suppliers
        • Machinery
        • Materials
        • Molds/Tooling
        • Product news
        • Design
      • More News
        • K Show
        • Mergers & Acquisitions
        • Sustainability
        • Public Policy
        • Material Insights Videos
        • Numbers that Matter
      • Digital Edition
      • End Markets
        • Automotive
        • Packaging
        • Medical
        • Consumer Products
        • Construction
      • Special Reports
        • Processor of the Year
        • Best Places to Work
        • Women Breaking the Mold
        • Rising Stars
        • Diversity
        • Most Interesting Social Media Accounts in Plastics
      • Newsletters
      • Resin pricing news
      • Videos
    • Opinion
      • The Plastics Blog
      • Kickstart
      • One Good Resin
      • Pellets and Politics
      • All Things Data
      • Viewpoint
      • From Pillar to Post
      • Perspective
      • Mailbag
      • Fake Plastic Trees
    • Shop Floor
      • Blending
      • Compounding
      • Drying
      • Injection Molding
      • Purging
      • Robotics
      • Size Reduction
      • Structural Foam
      • Tooling
      • Training
    • Events
      • K Show Livestream
      • Plastics News Events
        • Plastics News Executive Forum
        • Injection Molding & Design Expo
        • Plastics News Caps & Closures
        • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum
        • Plastics in Automotive
      • Industry Events
      • Injection Molding & Design Expo
      • Livestreams/Webinars
        • PN Live: Mergers and Acquisitions
      • Editorial Livestreams
        • Polymer Points Live
        • Numbers that Matter Live
        • Plastics in Politics Live
        • Sustainable Plastics Live
      • Ask the Expert
      • Plastics News Events Library
        • Plastics Caps & Closures Library
        • Plastics in Healthcare Library
        • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum Library
      • Processor of the Year submissions
    • Rankings & Data
      • Injection Molders
      • Blow Molders
      • Film Sheet
      • Thermoformers
      • Pipe Profile Tubing
      • Rotomolders
      • Mold/Toolmakers
      • LSR Processors
      • Recyclers
      • Compounders - List
      • Association - List
      • Plastic Lumber - List
      • All
    • Directory
    • Resin Prices
      • Commodity TPs
        • Historic Commodity Thermoplastics
      • High Temp TPs
        • Historic High Temp Thermoplastics
      • ETPs
        • Historic Engineering Thermoplastics
      • Thermosets
        • Historic Thermosets
      • Recycled Plastics
        • Historic Recycled Plastics
    • Custom
      • Sponsored Content
      • LS Mtron Sponsored Content
      • Conair Sponsored Content
      • KraussMaffei Sponsored Content
      • ENGEL Sponsored Content
      • White Papers
      • Classifieds
        • Place an Ad
        • Sign up for Early Classified