BASF Opens Major Surface Treatment Facility

The Surface Treatment global business unit of BASF's Chemetall brand, part of the coatings division, celebrated the opening of a state-of-the-art surface treatment production facility in Pinghu, located in Zhejiang Province, China. Designed as a smart factory, the facility enables various digital applications and automation. Spanning 60,000 square metres, the Pinghu facility is BASF's first production plant in the Dushan Port Economic Development Zone and the company's largest surface treatment facility globally. BASF Head of Paints Division Uta Holzenkamp said: "In July this year, we expanded our automotive refinish paints production capacity at our Jiangmen facility in Guangdong Province. Today, we celebrate the opening of our new surface treatment facility in Pinghu. We are strategically positioned close to our customers to provide solutions developed to meet local needs and tested over time. Our objective is to be a growth-focused leader in surface technology that supplies sustainable solutions, services, expertise and innovation supporting our customers across various sectors and in China, our key emerging market," Holzenkamp stated. Christophe Cazabeau, Senior Vice President responsible for Surface Treatment in BASF's Coatings Division, said: "Asia-Pacific is the world's fastest-growing surface treatment market, and China accounts for approximately 50% of the market in Asia. We believe China's market will demonstrate attractive growth rates in the medium to long term. By localising our advanced processes and solutions such as our thin-film technology Oxsilan®, we are strengthening our leading position in China and will significantly reduce delivery times to our local customers," Cazabeau stated. Designed as a smart factory, the Pinghu facility enables high levels of process automation in field operations and end-to-end digitalisation for high efficiency in production and on-site logistics. The new facility offers a comprehensive portfolio of applied surface treatment products and solutions for various market segments including automotive OEMs and components, coils, general industry, cold forming, aerospace, aluminium coating and glass.   Source