JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #33 - June 2007 - 26

BUSINESS Market survey changed considerably, mainly due to the growth of industries using composite parts. While hand lay-up accounted for the biggest market share in 2002, this shifted to more automated processes, particularly filament winding, in 2005 (Figure 4). This trend is due to the construction of new FRP pipe factories and to the creation of new market segments in the oil, petrochemical, and water industries (Figure 5). In general, it appears that automated processes have a higher growth rate than non-automated ones. With the exception of volume production of pipes and joints, most of the composite market is still dominated by hand lay-up and spray-up processes. The rapid growth of the thermoplastic composites market is driven by the car industry. Modern cars (either imported or produced domestically) have been gaining access to Iran’s market in recent Glass-fibre import sources years (Figure 6). Production and quality-control standards also improved greatly, resulting in an increased demand for the production of reinforced-thermoplastic engineering parts. The production of particulate thermoplastic composites is also noticeable. Fig. 5: Production volumes of filament-wound composite parts (2002-2005). Fig. 6: Production volumes of fibre-reinforced thermoplastics (2002-2005). JEC Composites Magazine / No33 June 2007 European and South-East Asian countries are the main sources that supply glass fibres to the Iranian composite market. These sources have also changed considerably over the past years, due to changes in the world composite market. Since China entered the glass-fibre export market - increasing both its production capacity and fibre quality - it seems to have taken over the Iranian market. According to the statistics, China’s share of the Iranian composite market has risen from 11.5% in 2001 to 61% in 2005, mainly because Chinese fibres are cheap. Nevertheless, these fibres are suited to Iran's composite industry, which is not regarded as high-technology. The share of various countries in glass-fibre exports to Iran is shown in Figures 7 and 8. These statistics show that Iran's composite industry currently benefits from the drop in raw material prices. On the other hand, the composite parts produced are economically competitive with their foreign counterparts because the technical knowledge and the skilled labour required are cheaper in Iran. Therefore, when competing with foreign suppliers, domestic suppliers are at low risk for sudden decreases in the price of composite products. For instance, the Please complete the form on line: www.jeccomposites.com/magazine-subscription/ More information: www.IranPolymerInstitute.org www.Polyfiber.ir www.IranComposite.net FREE SUBSCRIPTION (1 year/8 issues) Fig. 8: Share of various countries in glass fibre exports to Iran in 2006 (9 months). Fig. 7: Share of various countries in glass fibre exports to Iran in 2005. lowest price of pultruded profiles imported from China in 2004 was $2.11/kg, compared to $1.65/kg for producing similar profiles domestically, an advantage of about $0.5/kg. The price of profiles imported from Korea, Italy and France ranged from $4.3/kg to $8.5/kg.

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JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #33 - June 2007

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Issue #33 - June 2007