First ICIS Asian Surfactant Conference - Singapore
November 10th and 11th, 2011
This event was the second in our series of surfactant conferences co-produced by Neil A Burns LLC and ICIS and the first as part of our formal conference venture (the New York conference in May being a test run). Well over 100 senior executives from the Asian surfactant industry filled the ballroom at the Intercontinental Hotel in Singapore for two days of high quality papers and networking around the subject of surfactants, oleochemicals and feedstocks. Feedback was sufficiently strong that we have already penciled in the second Asian conference for November 1st and 2nd of next year in Singapore. Before then, of course, we have the second world surfactants conference in New York, April 24th and 25th and most likely, an event in Eastern Europe focused on that dynamic region.
As chairman of this conference, I had the privilege of introducing and listening to an incredibly strong field of presenters who brought forward subject matter and content, simply not available anywhere else. Listed below, is just one interesting point that I took away from each speaker. To get the full benefit – as I always like to say, you just have to be there..
Neil A Burns LLC: As noted, I chaired the conference. My traditional worry that attendees might tire of my voice, was not warranted. The quantity and quality of questions and debate from the floor was outstanding for each paper. Rarely did I have to contribute with a question of my own. One other takeaway for me was the quality of the attendee list with delegates from all five continents and representing the largest manufacturers and users of surfactants globally, such as Kao, P&G, Lion, Henkel, Unilever, Colgate, Stepan, Huntsman, Rhodia, BASF, Air Products, KLK, Wilmar, J&J and many others.
Lion Eco-Chemicals: Tsunieharu Maukaiyama, President – Mukaiyama San opened up the conference with a highly engaging overview of how his company integrates surfactant development and production into a market leading line of Lion consumer products, sold throughout Asia.
Emery Oleochemicals: Anthony Feng, Global Head of Strategy – Anthony made a strong case for an industry shift toward vertical integration from feedstocks to specialty surfactants, a strategy being pursued by Emery most recently via their ethoxylation JV with ERCA in the Netherlands.
Indian Oil Corporation (IOCL): Mathew George, Chief Manager – Mathew points out that the LAB market will be in a net deficit soon (2013); thus leaving room for a major new LAB plant in perhaps Northern India (perhaps to be built by IOCL? – no specific confirmation on that).
Seng Chye Cheah (retd. Acidchem): Mr. Cheah’s review of oleochemical capacities, current and forecast, is probably the most comprehensive available today. Wilmar’s newly announced 150 KMT/yr alcohol plant in India is sure to shake up the market there.
Rohen Specialties: Norman Ellard more than lived up to his reputation as an informative and engaging speaker with real expertise. Noted a new ethylene oxide derivative requirement using 70% EO content for cement additives, pulling in a lot of EO.
Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB): Zainab Idris gave the oil producers perspective with some interesting views on the use of Palm Oil in polyols. MPOB is Malaysias governments well funded and well organized palm trade body.
Kline and Company: Gillan exceeded even her top-ranked performance at the NY conference. She created some controversy with chart showing a 10 fold mark-up across the value chain from surfactant to personal care products. This engendered some spirited debate with Vivek Sirohi of Unilever, and others.
Unilever (India): Vivek Sirohi, VP R&D pointed out that, in Asia, there is competition from non-surfactant invasive procedures (i.e. Botox) that will cut into surfactant volumes used in cosmetics and personal care.
Battelle Memorial Institute: Heliana Kola gave an outstanding detailed analysis of the composition of many leading Asian laundry detergents. Of note was the huge rise in enzyme usage across the board in 2009.
Galaxy Surfactants: Yogesh Kalra, leader of international business creation. 75% of the Indian shampoo market is still sold in “single dose” sachets.
Desmet Ballestra sPa: “The professor” Icilio Adami gave us all a college course on sulfonation – compressed into 45 minutes. MES indicated as a serious alternative to LAB.
Lazard Investment Bank: Matthew Knott – Vice President of Lazard the number one ranked investment bank in Chemicals – gave a comprehensive overview of M&A in surfactants and a fascinating study of how focus and scale drove shareholder value in Croda.
Frost and Sullivan: Krithika Tyagarajan, Director of Frost & Sullivan, drew some powerful correlations between the growth of various middle classes throughout Asia and the growth of surfactants volumes.
Brenntag: Henri Nejade, CEO Brenntag Asia Pacific – Every 2 seconds, Brenntag is delivering an order of chemicals to someone, somewhere in the world – an increasing number of them in Asis, where Brenntag has acquired a strong position.
Purac: Frederik Feddes, Marketing Manager, outlined the emerging use of a lactose backbones for high performance surfactants.
Solazyme: Tim Dummer, Senior Director of Business Development pointed that Algae can be engineered to consist of 80% of oil – with a chain length tailored to your needs (whether 12/14, 16, 18 – saturated or unsaturated) – exciting stuff for our business.
Elevance Renewable Sciences: Andy Schafer, EVP of Sales and Marketing – talked about the upcoming 180KMT/yr bio-refinery in Indonesia – JV’d with Wilmar –with big impact on the surfactant value chain in a number of areas (including laurics).