Taiwan's plastics sector uses 4.0 to extend its reach

Tainan, Taiwan — Taiwanese machinery makers are using Industry 4.0 technology as part of an effort to grow their sales base in Europe.

At K 2019 in Düsseldorf, Germany, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) consolidated offerings from 48 different companies while another 50 companies were featured at other booths.

"We will show machines in line with 4.0 trends by combining robotic arms, data analysis, cloud computing and internet of things," Walter Yeh, president and CEO of TAITRA, said in May during a week long effort to promote smart machinery in the country. TAITRA organized the tour that featured more than 10 companies in several sectors.

"Taiwan has world-class innovations and technologies," he added.

The island country of just 23.5 million residents is a powerhouse of machine building. The country had US$1.17 billion of plastics and rubber machinery exports in 2018. That's up a tick from the $1.16 billion reported in 2017. Companies in the country exported a total of 27,582 units, and it is the fifth-largest exporter of plastics machinery in the world. Its top export markets are China and the United States.

Alex Ko, chairman of Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry, said 95 percent of Taiwanese machine builders are small- to medium-sized companies. And this small nature has allowed them to work together with many supplying parts and technology to machine manufacturers. The country has dubbed the area around the city of Taichung as the "golden corridor" because of all the companies clustered near one another.

"Many suppliers are not far away from one another so it is easy to form strategic alliances," Ko said.

He said the components are high quality, and because of minimal transportation costs, the alliances save money that is passed to processors when they buy the machine.

"This results in a good quality that is equal to the U.S. and others, but with a better price," Ko said.

Bush Hsieh, managing director of Chumpower Machinery Corp., said the company tries to develop comprehensive systems for its blow molding customers.

"Not every customer will need smart machines to this level," he said. "But we want to have systems that our competitors don't have."

Chumpower sells into 103 countries, and its Industry 4.0 system is about giving managers data in real time along with anticipating machine failure before it happens.

"It's about the collection of data and management of big data," Hsieh said. "It's not about manless operations. It's all about data."

Yeh said the trend has turned toward smart machinery, and Taiwan is primed to take advantage of its resources.

"Taiwan is one of the few countries with an advantage in both machinery and IT products. For this reason, our government has determined that smart machinery is the key for further developments," he said. "Our smart machinery and IT industry will benefit from integrated public and private resources, which will take our essential technology into manufacturing to the next level."