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Teijin Recognized for Global Automotive Carbon Composites Technology Innovation

28 Jul '11

4 min read

Teijin Limited announced today that its mass production technologies for carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) have been recognized by Frost & Sullivan through their 2011 Global Automotive Carbon Composites Technology Innovation Award.

"Teijin's new CFRP compression molding technology offers a low cost-to-performance alternative, which makes it ideal for metal replacement in large structural body-in-white components," said Sandeepan Mondal, Senior Research Analyst at Frost & Sullivan. "The drastically reduced cycle times along with the development of economical thermoplastic resin intermediate materials and high processability which gives processors greater design freedom, have paved the way for Teijin to be a technology leader in automotive carbon composites. These achievements of Teijin are deservedly recognized with the Frost & Sullivan 2011 Global Technology Innovation Award."

Teijin's innovation enables a significant reduction in cycle times – to under a minute – required for molding automobile body structure. Conventional CFRP utilizes thermosetting resin and requires at least five minutes for this process, making it unsuited for mass production applications, such as for general-purpose automobiles, and limiting its use to high-end vehicles. Teijin's breakthrough, achieved utilizing thermoplastic CFRP, overcomes one of the biggest challenges in the industry and represents a significant leap forward in the use of carbon fiber in mass production of automobiles.

With increasingly strict environmental standards and regulations in the automotive industry, there is mounting pressure to reduce vehicle weights through the use of lightweight materials, such as CFRP, for components conventionally made from steel or aluminum. The Teijin Group, the world's second largest producer of carbon fiber, is well positioned to be a leader in the development of such applications for CFRP.

"We are pleased that our automotive carbon fiber composite technologies were recognized by Frost & Sullivan as the industry leader," said Norio Kamei, general manager of Teijin's Carbon Fibers and Composites Business Group and president of Toho Tenax Co., Ltd. "The award is highly meaningful for us as we accelerate our expansion of advanced composite materials – one of the pillars of the Teijin Group's long-term growth strategy. We will further our efforts in this key field, aiming to facilitate new vehicle architecture featuring significantly lighter bodies."

Frost & Sullivan's Technology Innovation Award is presented each year to companies that demonstrate outstanding excellence in new products and technologies within its industry. The award recognizes the quality and depth of a company's development, based on solid groundwork, secondary resources and analyst feedback. Teijin's innovation was benchmarked against leading competitors in the industry, in terms of uniqueness of technology, impact on new products/applications, impact on functionality, impact on customer value and relevance of innovation to the industry. Frost & Sullivan is a growth consulting and a market research firm with operations worldwide.

About Frost & Sullivan
Frost & Sullivan, the Growth Partnership Company, enables clients to accelerate growth and achieve best-in-class positions in growth, innovation and leadership. The company's Growth Partnership Service provides the CEO and the CEO's Growth Team with disciplined research and best-practice models to drive the generation, evaluation and implementation of powerful growth strategies. Frost & Sullivan leverages 50 years of experience in partnering with Global 1000 companies, emerging businesses and the investment community from more than 40 offices on six continents.

About the Teijin Group
Based in Tokyo and Osaka, Japan, Teijin is a global technology-driven group operating in eight main fields: aramid fibers, carbon fibers & composites, polyester fibers, plastics, films, medical & pharmaceuticals, fiber products marketing and IT businesses. Teijin Limited, the holding company for the Teijin Group, is listed on the Tokyo and Osaka stock exchanges. The group, comprising 150 companies and 17,542 employees worldwide, had consolidated sales of JPY 815.7 billion (USD 10.1 billion) and total assets of JPY 761.5 billion (USD 9.5 billion) in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2011.

Teijin Limited