Plastec West evidences cautious optimism

Plastec West seemed a bit more lively than a year ago. The aisles were more crowded and there was more excitement about business in 2010 than at last year’s event.

Plastec West 2009 came while the stock market was in free-fall, and with business and industry bogged down in uncertainty. However, Plastec West 2010 was much different and there was even a bit of cautious optimism in the air. “It’s better but fragile,” noted Incoe’s Jim Bott, when asked how he was seeing the mold manufacturing industry.

A number of molders are doing well including Classic Industries Inc., an injection molding company headquartered in Latrobe, PA, serving the medical device and healthcare industries, which recently purchased RW Injection Moulding Ltd. in Middleton-in-Teesdale in the Northeast of England to form Classic Industries Europe Ltd.

The acquisition provides Classic Industries Inc. an operation in the United Kingdom to serve medical device and healthcare customers throughout Europe. This acquisition complements Classic Industries Inc. manufacturing operations in other global locations including El Paso, Texas; Ponce, Puerto Rico; and Shanghai, China.

Classic Industries is a global provider of products and services to world-class medical device and healthcare OEMs. Capabilities include advanced engineering and technology, cleanroom thermoplastic injection molding, logistics, and value added services.

Mission Plastics Inc. in Ontario, CA, has expanded its operations considerably with the addition of the molding operations of Beckman Coulter in Fullerton, CA.  According to David Fortezzo, business development manager for Mission, the company has a third production room (15,000 ft², called the Beckman room) completed. Mission purchased approximately nine presses from Beckman which are running Beckman products exclusively, and anticipates adding another three presses to bring to the total in that production room to a dozen.

Mission also purchased three new Arburg presses to mold the newly acquired Safety Syringe Inc. business. That brings Mission's production space to over 50,000 ft² total. However, Fortezzo notes that there’s room for more opportunities. “In some instances we’re pulling work from back from Mexico, and we’re seeing OEMs taking a hard look at their proprietary molding operations and divesting of those to custom molders, such as Beckman did,” Fortezzo says. “We also have a full-fledged sales force, which Mission management believes is especially critical in a down economy, and recently hired two project coordinators to manage the new programs we have coming in.”

Pyramid Mold & Tool in Rancho Cucamonga, CA, recently added a new 220-ton Arburg electric press with dual core pull, said Tony May, director of Business Development. The company already has a 110-ton press at its Tech Center.  The presses are equipped with Frigel cooling systems and have E-Dart RJG capabilities installed. May noted that the outlook for Pyramid is good for this year. “Things are picking up and we hope it stays on track to be a good year,” he said. “We’ve currently got a good backlog, and our forecast is projecting a good year. The show has been pretty good as well, so I find that encouraging.” —Clare Goldsberry