Guangzhou, Guangdong – Polyurethane and upstream materials maker Huafon has been supplying dual-component polyurethane for tyres and seats used in shared bikes across China since the end of 2016, the company told UTECH-polyurethane.com.
'Our product has better performance in low resilience, making the ride smoother' said Huafon New Materials’ marketing manager Xu Xu in an exclusive interview, 'and tyres using our materials could run for 3,000 km compared with China’s industry average of 2,000 km.
The group’s new materials business, including polyurethane elastane materials, saw a 15% rise in revenue to CNY 20bn ($3bn), and expects to maintain the momentum over the next few years.
Nevertheless, Xu is concerned about China’s rapidly rising MDI and TDI price, which may lead to the switch to other materials such as PVC, EVA and rubber in application. Xu predicts the price will fall back to a medium level next year, and points out that polyurethane is still hard to replace in terms of its density and properties profile.
Huafon already has other upstream facilities on stream to counter the risks in feedstock prices. With a 180 kT/year adipic acid project to start up within the year, the company will become the world’s largest maker of the material with 540 kT/year capacity. It also recently expanded into polyols.
