“Great innovative work being done by Aditya Birla Advanced Materials in Thailand”, remarks H.E. Mrs. Durai.
H.E. Mrs. Suchitra Durai, the Ambassador of India to the Kingdom of Thailand, visited the Aditya Birla Chemicals – Advanced Materials’ facilities at MapTaPhut Industrial Estate in Rayong Province on 10 April 2021. Advanced Materials is a leading global manufacturer of Epoxy Resins & Systems and is part of the $46 billion Fortune 500 conglomerate Aditya Birla Group. Operating in Thailand since 1969, the group has nine manufacturing units, across five lines of business, with 3500 employees.
On the request of Mr. Sanjeev Sood, Country Head (Group Affairs), Aditya Birla Group – Thailand, Her Excellency consented for the visit. The Ambassador, with senior members of the Embassy of India, were given a tour of the R&D, Application Development Centre and the manufacturing plant to highlight the journey of the company, Advanced Materials, which commenced operations in 1992, and its successful transformation from a regional commodity manufacturer to a global innovation leader with a focus on sustainability, bio-based materials, and green chemistry. It has made significant contributions to the Thai economy with consistently high exports (>80%) to all the developed economies and by creating quality jobs.
The ambassador took keen interest in understanding Recyclamine®, a novel & disruptive technology owned by the company that addresses the longstanding and compelling issue of recyclability of thermoset epoxy plastics. Used extensively in applications like wind energy, aerospace, defence, automobiles, waste generated during processing and at the end of life of thermoset plastic globally is estimated to be 5 million tons per annum. This ends up in landfills or is processed by energy-intensive inefficient processes which result in increased pollution and global warming. Advanced Materials’ proprietary technology, Recyclamine® offers a game-changing, lasting solution. One of its kind globally, it enables recycling of thermoset epoxy plastics while providing superior performance compared to conventional materials.
Unit Head & Joint President, Mr. Yuvraj Patil, stated that Recyclamine® technology has been successfully commercialised for customers globally and a pilot plant for seed marketing of Recyclamine® and supply to leading composite manufacturers has been commissioned. The company is in the process of establishing a new manufacturing plant for Recyclamine® with 10,000 tons per annum capacity, located at WHA Industrial Estate. The plant will subsequently be expanded to 50,000 tons per annum capacity. In coming years Thailand will be the pioneer and hub for Recyclamine® and the product will be exported all over the world. The R&D team further explained the details of other products such as bio-based epoxy resins, green chemistry offerings, and waterborne systems, among others.
H.E. the Ambassador applauded the fact that Recyclamine® facilitates a closed-loop system linked to “circular economy”. He also noted that it contributes in creating value from waste, as the material recovered from recycling can be re-used and re-purposed for making representative plastic components. She congratulated the team on the extraordinary, world class work being done by the company and expressed the hope that the initiatives taken by the company will support the Thai government’s new economic model, Thailand 4.0, and the development of an innovation-driven economy.