Cheaper than China Molds?

I know exactly how you feel. I have wasted the last month trying to chase factories in the USA to get a new product on the shelf. Most dont bother to return phone calls and are very dismissive. I wanted to keep my production in the USA - selling hundreds of millions of units per year - we could have provided a company with a 24 hr three shift a day staffing opportunity - but no one wants it. I was recently in China and their new motto is "If the USA dont want your business, we do" and it is so true.....

Hi,

I think you can have a tour in China and India, you will know them much better.

If you find a good supplier ,Whether in China or India, you will not want to change supplier. About the labor, it's according to the development of the country .

Best Regards

Candy

Sales

KWL Mold Technology Co., Ltd.

Skype:kwlmold

Email: candy.guan@kwl-china.com

We are plastic injection mould supplier from Huangyan China Sigg Mould.,Ltd.Professional design and manufacture all kinds of plastic injection mould .

for my many years experience.i think China mould better than india.

Sigg Mould Co.,Ltd
Fax:86-0576-84728899
Tel:86-0576-84737888
Email:sales02@siggmould.com
Web:www.siggmould.com

I do agree India is a sleeping giant that may give China a run for its money when it wakes up to meet the world. India has a closed in economy and imports are highly restricted, which means they are highly self sustainable. Cheap is also not necessarily good. China does have high quality mold technology but with so many of them around how do you know which one to choose? Now you say if you pay good money you will get good mold so why offer your ‘competitive prices’ in the first place?

Matt
http://orange.floorcoveringsinternational.com/

Hello, The best mold making co. in the U.S. ive seen, is a place in Batavia Illinois, called Fidelity Tool and Mold LTD. their prices are reasonible, but the quality is amazing!

@Honestly mold makers in the USA......

I can help. I have dozens of tooling/molding contacts that would be willing to look at your mold/production needs. Send info to:

keith@keithwarnick.com

Welcome to Huangyan LC mould factory. We are one of the major manufacturers and exporters of plastic cap and PET bottle Preform moulding system in China. Our products have been sold to two decade of countries and areas. LC mould factory majored in making high quality PET preform moulds,cap moulds,bottle blow moulds, variety plastics moulds and auxiliary equipments needed necessarily in PET ind-ustry.The main purpose of our company is to assist businesses all around the world in produ-cing products in high quality, including PET Preform, plastic bottles and other plastic products. Due to our efforts in the recent years, our company has gathered a number of excellent tec-hnicians and The advanced CNC equipments.Our technicians will offer the best service from designing to the service for our products.And we have established the computer file for sales all molds and the equipment spare parts,so We can send the needed parts to customers in ti-me. Meanwhile, under prerequisite that ensure the quality of products, we will provide low pr-ice parts. In order to guarantee the quality of the parts and sending the parts in time. We believed the "customer satisfaction is goal" which we pursues.Please let us help you do from the selection of machine to the manufacture of bottles. You will find that our products and service are as good as we have promised. If you have any questions, you could write to us by E-mail to hinka126@126.com. And we will reply as soon as possible。

Dears,

I am intrested to know , why chines moudls are cheaper than Indian cost.whats are the policies of them to get cheaper material & other cost shrinkage's.
Please explore in detail on following e:mail I.D

Jagdish Patil

jjpatil@sintex.co.in

Hi，as to the india and china mould industry,I have a friend from india talking about the PET mould steel,I use AL7075,he use the used steel sheet from the ship ,how could that be compared?

Steven

Honestly mold makers in the USA are just not hungry enough for the most part. We tried really hard to do a couple molds in the USA recently (we want to keep business here if possible) and called several dozen companies. But most of the factories we spoke to were quite dismissive, they pretty much hang up the phone right away if it's not medical or military. Only one factory could be bothered to actually provide a quote, but they could only provide part of the molds and soon ignored our followup emails. We weren't asking them to match the China price.

Hii All

does anybody looking for outsourcing from southeast asia.i'm actually from indonesia.our country have many investor company from japan and south korea.just check it if you excited about it.

thank

Hi Amigos

My company is specialized in making all kinds of injection molds. all my factory modls 100% export globally. I am honored to introduce that we were boomed from a 20 workers shop till today over 300 workers and 40 sets advanced machines company. our customer covers several global leading companies.
Our produces ranged electronics,stationary,toilets,kitchens,toy,automobile,sellular phones etc.

I am sure we are able to assist your business greatly! not only mold quality (USA 101 class,Hasco or DME standard,high standard steels and machining technique),also good price and very prompt delivery (normally complex mold within 35 days, prototype molds in 15 days to sending samples.).

So,please take your initiative to send us drawing and enquiry, we can reaction to you rapidly.
Let's take the 1st step begin a new future, now.

Best regards
Harry Lee
Tel:+86 769 8166 7742
Fax:+86 769 8166 7741
Cel:+86 136 8663 0553
http://www.cy-mold.com/

Hello

I am from India and spent 25 year in US in Tooling Industries. I moved my Toolroom and molding company in India 5 year ago. I have Indian and US Customers very happy with my work. We have lot of good and bad Toolroom in India like any other countery. But India is more suitable for close tolrance part at better price.

Surjit

"I think that if we do not find a way to get Moldmaking back in the united states..."
Shawn

I totally agree Shawn. We also need to be as driven to get the business. So far I don't see a lot of US companies getting on here and asking for the business, as I see others doing from outside US. I think we also tend to be more strict on who we will do business with in the US but then we will send it to China or others. We need to be really hungry to be competitive and the best.

I think that if we do not find a way to get Moldmaking back in the united states we will all be out of a job. Even you guys that live here and build your molds out of country. There are plenty of good mold shops here in the US that are trying to compete with pricing all around the world. Seems like these days companies are looking at what I can get today instead of what my future will be.

Shawn

some of your points is reasonable.
put aside the lower labor cost in India, are there any more advantage in moldmaking to compare with China?
To say the least, China has its strongpoints such as mature techlogy, on-time delivery, competitive price, better service and good warranty for their molds and products. of course, there are few molders without reputation, it is inescapable for every country.

Brent,

I'm not sure whether india moldmakers can offer lower price than China. Two engineers of LG India told me that several years ago they bought mouds from Taiwan, but now they turn to China mainland. You can see, if they can find molds with high quality and even lower cost than China molds. How come they buy molds from us?

Brian

Brend,
Compared with, India's advantages at present are in software, financing.
When it comes to the mold making, which bases on the industry foundation and manufacturing experience, I definitely agree with bleibman---India is behind China (performance/price).

After so many foreign manufacturing companies invests in China for so many years, its manufacturing & quality control level has been brought to a new height. Driven by the global company's value-added campaign, mold makers in China also benefit from the advanced tool/methedology---6 sigma, lean manufacturing,etc, and pass the added value on to the customers.

Roison Qiu
roison.qiu@drapho.com
Drapho--Mold maker for small size complicated parts

Hi Brent,

I have been working with global suppliers for the past 11 years, the first 4 as outsourcing manager for the Injet div. of Xerox and the last 7 as owner of my own company, Delkew Enterprises (www.delkew.com). We provide all types of tooling and components to our US customers (Xerox, Kodak, IBM, Tyco, etc..) The Asian tooling business is still fairly young, perhaps China has the most experience, about 15 years. You will not find many Chinese tooling companies that have been in business making injection molds for more then 15 years. India is about 5 to 10 years behind China and much slower at picking up the business. As far as written communication, the Chinese had a very good command of the English language, as far as oral communication, they speak slow and at times make mistakes, but I have less problem understanding any of my Chinese friends on the phone then my fast speaking, heavily accented Indian friends
Bernie Leibman

>I hear that India will soon
>give China a run for
>their money, as far as
>low cost molds for Injection.
>Supposedly they have cheaper labor,
>a corps of well educated
>engineers, and, are better equipped
>to comunicate with us English
>speakers.
>
>Have any of you Molders/Mold Makers
>had any experience with this
>or any knowledge of Indian
>Tools.
>
>Only serious replies will be tolerated,
>as this is one of
>my few serious querys!
>
>
>thanks,
>
>brent

You will never believe how many molds we have made for India market...
including the bumpers' molds...
PET Molds..etc..

Hey Brent,

Couldnt resist my 2 cents, call it nationalistic pride :).

I work in US (in Chicago actually!), but am from India.

I've been to Shanghai and have experience dealing with Chinese molds.

I think you will find pretty good tool makers as well as processing guys (There's a school out there which just graduates Process Techs..I think its called CIPET). Heck, even UMass Lowell has quite a bit of people from India studying Plastics!!!

I've had experience dealing with tool makers out there and if you know what you want, then they should be able to give to you.

I think the biggest advantage India has over China is communication. I had a hard time in Shanghai with no knowledge of Mandarin trying to have the front desk set up an alarm,in an international hotel!

One of the guys was wondering about the IPRs and courts...the systems are in place to prevent copyright infringement and you can easily take a person/ entity to court.

Labor is definately cheap (talking about operators and machinists) compared to China, but then at times you get what you pay for (which is true for any country!) A guy with a degree and experience would probably be about 2.0k to 2.5k USD/ year. An expatriate or a really smart person would probably be close to 15 - 20 k/yr. Hell, I'd probably take a 1/3rd of my pay for the right company, job and location in India!!!!

I've had a buddy of mine order mold components from India and mold bases from China, and it worked out pretty well for him.

If you're going to setup a plant out there, I would definately suggest a local partner in the initial stages and then you can always buy out the partner. (no laws which prevent you from owning a 100% of your company)

Keep on Molding, as my Professor back in India used to say, one plant one life, use plastics save life ( wonder what the environmentalists would think about tht!)

Brent
A few years ago, I had a mold partly made in India. Local toolmaker of Indian background sent file for inserts to India. He then installed it in mold base he did locally. Made nice parts. Eventually the customer sold the mold to a Chinese molder so I guess it is in China making parts for Canada.
I also just recently sold my 1982 275 ton Engel to a guy shipping it to India. Had lots of fun getting it into a 20 ft container!

On another topic, I did go to Ohio to pick up my car. I was thinking of calling but it would have been Friday night rush hour in Chicago with a 6 sp standard new car. I can't think of less appealing esp. since I don't know Chicago area and it had snowed the previous week. Still was lots of snow in ditches around Peoria.
I made it home Monday 1PM. (Could have made it home Sunday night but for customs clearance.)
Bruce

Yes but Chinese Mandarin is better than Indian Mandarin! I have never been to India, but that is another old culture, and had exchanged much wisdom with China, when Europe was still in the dark ages.

brent

Brent, this is really a very good question! I'm from China and now working with a very big company in Canada. Sometimes I will chat with the customer on the Skype and one time we dicussed about the topic. He told me that some customers in North Amercia started setting their eyes on Indian mould makers. According to his knowing, the price there is almost the same as China or a bit higher. As for the quality, some are better while some are worse. Anyway, the natural enviorement of China is the best!
In China, as in many other places in the world, you may have good supplier als bad one among your supplier lists. Most of the time, it needs combined effort of customer and suppliers to get a job well done. Also, the quality and sevice is based on the budget you've giving to undergo the project. So it's very difficult to say India or China is better.You have to judge things based on overall factors.
It's a true thing that India's English is better than Chinese. However, our ablitity in communication gets better improvment and experience becomes much richer by years of experience in cooperating with English speakin countries.

Interesting!

brent

Brent

I saw this coming about 2 1/2 years ago. While I don't have first hand experience in India there are some things that set them up for limited success.
Communication ability, Engineering expertise.

While I was working in Asia specifically Singapore I noticed the amount of people there that are Indian. With the India economy growing as it is, the workers in SG will be going back because of the amount of jobs there. Taking with them their knowledge they have gained but not the business support.

I can tell you this. My company looked into expanding into India and after careful analysis we determined business support was not at the level we needed to go ahead at this time.

I had a customer that started a facility in India and it failed miserably. While the engineering was up to snuff the tool making ability just never came around.

I would expect that the quality of the molds in time to be equal to SG, but that will take time to tell. Overall cost will increase fast and it will become a wash in the end.

Just my observations, hope it helps.

BB

Dear sir,
you give a good forum.
For us , Price , quality, dilivery time is all important.
In India , China, USA , Japan , Korea, there are good mold companys , at the same time , there are bad mold company .
In China, India , the price is cheaper than USA, but it is not unlimited .Some companys from USA, EROUPE who want buy the cheapest mold ,so they buy the bad molds.
When you go to India or China, give them a good price , you will get good mold. It is same in USA, I think so .
Peter

Mail : design@chinamold-d.com

Hello,

I don't think so.

There is a saying: Mold is gold! if quality is good--short cycle time , run smoothly for long time...; if the mold quality is very bad, oh, my god, it is litter I think!

I am a sales executive work for the mold making and plastic injection company in China. I don't think there is problem on communications.

Richard
Email: sales01@mouldspace.com
Website: www.mouldspace.com

Dear Bent,

I think that it is better to see for oneself rather than to hear for many times, So I can't expect you deny hearsay absolutely, But I think that there are manufactures with bad service in every country, Of course, also has some manufactures with good service. So you have to visit the factory at first before you put order, and then make a decision.

In China, Most manufactures are good, they can meet the lead time,and the tolerance always very little, quality always very high!

Good day!

Alice Fan
alice@fareast-mold.com
happy55117@hotmail.com
http://www.fareast-mold.com

I think Indian moulds are costly than the Chinese as of date and the Parts as well.

Since i worked in a prestigious indian company [into plastics & die castings] for the global bidding of supplies to some top US /europe giant firms. I have known the scenario. Sorry to withheld the name of the company

But still at times Indian suppliers/ moulds are justified or prefered for the quality which China is not able to provide [although not right always].

My expereince says that India is good to develop engineering components.

I think till date Indian moulds are not cheaper than Chineese ones [of course there would be exceptions], Since I was working on global bidding of Toolings and Parts through a prestigious company [involved in plastics & die castings] in India, I am aware of the costing side. Sorry to withheld the name of the company.

However what i heard from the US/EUROPE multinationals to whom we used to supply parts, is that Indian Toolings are much better in terms of the quality and Consistancy. And to add all, the knowledge of English makes it easier for Indian Engineers and Tool makers to communicate with US tool designers.

Vimal

Brent,

Sounds interesting on the cost. I wonder about the other issues:

1) Intelectual property rights; are they protected in India?
2) Liability for deliverables after payments (or failed delivery).
3) Is there an effcient legal recourse to recover funds for poorly built parts/tooling.
4) It hard enough to find good processing even in the US? Is there an infrasturture of trained processing engineers with good molding machines?
5) Good communication skills and understanding of current technology.
6) Understanding of regualtory requirements for tooling and subsequent production parts (ie: VDA, AIAG, UL, OSHA, etc)

These have been huge problems when dealing with Asian tooling, specifically China.

I am always looking for a way to save a buck without losing my wallet in the process or bleeding with a bad tool for several years. This is especially true when I need to provide low cost tooling to attract molding business. I would be interested to hear some of the imm communities experiences reguarding these issues with different countries.

Thank you,
Dan Dykema
L.W. Reinhold Plastics
dan@rpiplastics.com

the low cost in india,but the poor technology in india also,remmeber the china have more experience in mold than india!

Alex
Msn:psq_21cn@hotmail.com

>Hello Brent,
>regarding India, the price level what
>i saw was the same
>like in China, to place
>tools in India makes only
>sense from my point of
>view, if you will also
>have the part production in
>India.
>Nevertheless at the moment the koreans
>are very competitive and i
>think the quality level of
>tools is better.
>Please contact me if you will
>have further questions.
>
>Roman Pehl

I'm working for a Korean company and I'd have to agree with Roman. Usually our prices are competitive with China's, and I would definately say our quality is much higher.
But then again, with the exchange rate fluxuations, sometimes we find it's cheaper to make the mold in our Japan factory thatn in Korea!

Ya know, that story in the beginning about the insert being made in India is a good idea. It might be worth outsourcing certain parts of the mold, if you can find a company to match your quality standards. You could save quite a bit and still keep some manufacturing in your company.
Research and creative thinking are key....

Hello Brent,
regarding India, the price level what i saw was the same like in China, to place tools in India makes only sense from my point of view, if you will also have the part production in India.
Nevertheless at the moment the koreans are very competitive and i think the quality level of tools is better.
Please contact me if you will have further questions.

Roman Pehl

Website you can get a list of Indian Mold (mould) manufacturers.

http://www.satyamplastics.com/webtop/browse/browse.php3?categoryLevel=6

I have been working in a mold facotry in China for more than two years, we also make the insert for one client from US, his end client is Delphi. He is satisfied with our quality and service very much!

In my opinion, India is indeed growing and competitive,but anyway, put aside the low cost, China still has his other advantage: hard working people, prompt lead time,mature technology and workmanship. As a moldmaker, price, quality and time,is the essential factor you have to consider, so at the time being, I thought China is a better Choice.

Jenny
Jenny_topmold@163.com

Brent,
Don't forget about Bader from Pakistan on the "other" site.
Bruce

Bruce,

Thanks, keep us informed about molding in India en general if you will. I know that they have quite a domestic market and industry, and I think they are about to burst out on the international (global) market.
As wages rise in China, ndia is waiting, I think to be the "new China".

brent

Brent
A few years ago a local tool maker who is from India sourced a very difficult curved handle insert from India. He then installed it in the mold base here in Canada to finish the mold. I wasn't privy to all the financial details but there was a substantial saving. The mold ran very well, the curved parting line sealed well. No complaints other than the owner of the mold selling it to someone who sent it to China to mold these handles!
Now another supplier of mine, another guy from India, is off to the India Plastic show. He is looking to rep material suppliers from India. I'll see how it goes when he gets back.
Bruce