Insight

A review and preview of the global fastener industry

A wide cross section of global fastener business leaders have contributed their retrospective of 2015 and thoughts on the prospects and challenges for 2016. We asked them to consider not just economic and financial issues but also technology drivers for the fastener industry and to identify priorities for the upcoming year. Here is NORMA's article:

NORMA Group
Werner Deggim, CEO

Industrial manufacturing in the euro zone is recovering only slowly and demand on the Chinese automotive market is weak. So how does a manufacturing company manage to still remain profitable and generate good profits?

At NORMA Group we manage to remain profitable and generate good profits thanks to our diversification. We are broadly positioned in various industries, which makes us less dependent on fluctuations in individual markets and regions.

This is all the more important because NORMA Group focuses on pioneering sectors such as the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. For this reason, the company opened its first clean room at its plant in the Czech Republic in June 2015. Single use systems are assembled under sterile conditions on roughly 150m² of space. These products, made of silicone, are used to transport and store liquids and gases and to take samples in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. According to the market analysts at BioPlan Associates Inc, the worldwide market for single use systems will grow to a volume of approximately 2.6 billion euros by 2016. By comparison, this figure was approximately 610 million euros in 2011. After all, single use systems offer a distinct advantage over conventional reusable systems – they don’t have to be laboriously cleaned and sterilised.

Besides this emerging future market, the automotive industry is and will remain an essential pillar for us. For instance, NORMA Group received several large orders from international automakers again in 2015. Our weight-reduced products are in demand because they reduce the overall weight of vehicles and thus fuel consumption and emissions. These major orders stimulate production by nearly 40 million products per year. Our connectors are installed in more than ten million newly produced vehicles. Among them are, in particular, NORMAQUICK PS3 quick connectors and NORMACLAMP V PP profile clamps, which are used in urea and cooling water systems – as well as turbochargers. Overall, in 2015 NORMA Group will have produced up to two billion joining products at its 22 plants around the world.

NORMA has also focused on new products for high loads, which includes products that have been developed specifically for OEMs in the area of engineered joining technology. For example, the ABA® Original SMO worm drive clamp, which is made of stainless steel and therefore reliably stands up to severe climatic conditions and extreme industrial requirements – such as salt water or chemicals. There is also the SSL quick connector made of plastic, which can be latched twice very quickly and easily by clicking and snapping it. Therefore, no tools are needed to install it in fuel and urea systems. These are all products that NORMA Group successfully brought to market in 2015.

I have no doubt that 2016 will also be a successful year for the company. We are well positioned and will continue to grow. I think that the main trends for 2016 will focus on three major topics – exhaust gas after treatment, lightweight construction and water management. Increasingly tougher emission standards call for solutions that reduce nitrogen emissions. And not just in Europe, but all over the world, including the emerging markets. The answer is urea lines for selective catalytic reduction technology. Products that have less weight also help to reduce emissions and energy consumption. Our products can save up to several hundred kilograms of weight in a ship or an aeroplane. Converted into emissions, this can mean a reduction of hundreds of thousands of kilograms of CO₂.

Just recently, the worldwide water shortage has been increasingly demanding fuel-efficient, yet effective product solutions for irrigation and drainage, for example, in agriculture, as well as an efficient water supply – solutions that NORMA Group already has today. This will be one of the biggest challenges in the next few years in many regions of the world.