Many presentations from stakeholders in the industry deal with the theme of coatings from technological or regulatory perspective. The focus of this paper will be to address the subject from a market standpoint, aiming to identify and quantify the coatings sectors where technology has the best opportunities for future penetration. Topics will include: Macro Economic Environment, Current State of the industry, Global Wood Coatings Market, Coatings suppliers, Emerging Trends, Strategic Issues. Delegates will see the bigger picture (a) to identify growth opportunities and (b) to enrich analysis of the market and its players.

Louis McCulloch has over 30 years’ experience in the coatings industry in senior management positions with mainstream paintmakers and since the mid 1980s as Business Development Consultant.
His sole focus has been the paint industry where he can call on a global network of contacts and in-depth knowledge of decorative, protective, automotive and industrial segments.
His area of expertise is companies and markets. Typically he reports on current trends among the top global companies and conducts assignments that include partnerships, acquisition and market studies.
He is a regular contributor to trade media and speaker at industry and company conferences.

Rutile nano-TiO2 were coated on the wood surface by a room temp wet chemical route. Thin solgel films were deposited on the wood surface by dipping in a sol prepared from a mixture of methyltrimethoxysilane, hexadecyltrimethoxysilane and aluminium isopropoxide precursors. The effect of curing temp on weathering performance of wood specimens coated with the combination coating was evaluated by measuring weight loss, changes in surface colour, morphology, surface chemistry and wettability before and after exposure to UV light and water spray. Results of all the tests will be presented.

Dr. Mandla A. Tshabalala is a Research Chemist at the USDA Forest Service, Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin. He is a member of the American Chemical Society. He has 30 years of R&D experience. His research interests include:

• Material properties of the wood cell wall

• Surface chemistry of wood polymers and related lignocellulosic materials

• Performance properties of hybrid inorganic-organic thin films on wood substrates

• Isolation, characterization and material properties of hemicelluloses

• Development wood fiber-based water treatment products

Rongbo Zheng, associate professor of Southwest Forestry University. The research mainly focused on nanomaterials and their functionalization to wood.

Hybrid fluoro-silocon coating resin as well as its functionalization is going to play a key role for emerging coating science and technology. Creative using of the specific kind resin will bring important innovation for functional coatings and even smart coatings. Knowledge to balance the excellent performance and its cost for advanced fluoro-silicon hybrid resin determines how to add business value and meet customer satisfaction for future coating development.

Mr. Patrick Zhao is the president of Beijing Sino-Rich Material Science Co., Ltd., and a specialist in fluoro-resin / fluoro-coating. He has been actively participating in the CHINACOAT series of Conference and the Annual Conference on Fluoro-Silicone Coatings by presenting a number of papers.

The basic mechanism controlling the fire resistance behaviour of polymers will be first reviewed with emphasis on the intumescent systems. Halogen based FR and their environmental impacts will be critically assessed. Testing methods to evaluate fire resistant properties and their implications will be described for various applications. Due to the long-term persistence and toxicity of halogen based FR, increasing pressure has been posed from regulatory authorities to develop halogen free FR systems and these new systems, including a new halogen free patented FR system, will be presented.

Dr. Swaraj Paul has published more than 50 papers both in national and international scientific and technical journals, and owns several patents.

He has held over 50 lectures and seminars at different conferences and congresses at both national and international levels. He was also the Course Director for “Non Polluting Coating Systems” in Holland and Davos during 1987-1989, organized by CEI-Europe/Elsevier.

New spherical hyper-branched polymers with encapsulated aminic pigmentaffine groups offer zero technical restrictions such as shorter pot-life or gelation. These solvent-free products with core-shell structure are highly effective wetting and dispersing additives without any influence on pot-life in 2K PUs. Derived from 'macromer technology', this unique invention allows for new surface properties e.g. hydrophilicity, intercoat adhesion and anti-fogging effects. These additives also improve levelling of coatings without reduction of slip and surface energy.

Dr. Michael Bessel studied chemistry at the Universities of Jena, FU Berlin and Heidelberg and was a fellow of the Graduate College 850 “Molecular Modelling” of the German Research Foundation DFG. After having a postdoctoral position at the CAT Catalytic Center at the RWTH Aachen, he started his professional career at BYK in Wesel, Germany. After 3 years in the research department for surface additives, being responsible for UV & Leveling additives, he is now leading a research lab for the development of new wetting and dispersing additives at BYK.

Waterborne UV radiation curing is used increasingly to coat wooden furnitures because of the excellent properties of the formulated coating, fast curing and ecofriendliness. Considerable R&D effort resulted in a range of waterborne UV curable products for very demanding applications e.g. parquet, furniture, kitchen cabinet and many others-from primer to topcoat, high gloss to matt, clear varnish to pigmented applications. A new tin-free formulation will be presented.

Ms. Wenli Jin, TS&D Engineer for Industrial Wood Coating, is responsible for technical service, product application and development for the Greater China region. She joined UCB (Allnex original) in 2000, and has 15 years of experience in radiation curable coatings.

Two component polyurethanes are used in a variety of industrial coating applications due to their excellent weatherability, toughness, and chemical resistance. When formulated as ambient cured systems, traditional two component polyurethanes typically must balance cure speed for pot life. This paper describes the chemistry and performance attributes of a novel ambient cure, two component isocyanate free polyurethane coating technology based on the reaction of polycarbamates with polyaldehydes. One significant benefit is the ability to decouple pot life from cure speed, which allows for the development of coating formulations with longer pot life without sacrificing fast hardness development and quick dry time. For the applicator, these attributes provide faster return to service, higher productivity and less material waste. Additional coating benefits, including good appearance, chemical and stain resistance, will be described for applications over wood substrates.

Yawei Xu is currently the associate research scientist of Industrial and Functional coating R&D, DCM, Dow Chemical. Previously, he also worked in Analytical Science in Core R&D. Yawei received a BSc degree in chemistry from Fudan University in 2006 and received PhD degree in chemistry from Fudan University in 2011.

With growing influence of environmental regulation in China, the domestic wood coatings industry is expected to face increasing difficulties. This report will discuss the market developments and future trends for important applications and discuss how companies can navigate this rapidly changing conditions. This include insights from all players in the value chain: from wood coating suppliers to intermediate channel players and wood furniture manufacturers.

Ms. Ariel Jiang has over 6 years of experience and has taken part in around 30 projects of research in GCiS. She has participated in projects for leading international companies including Dow Corning, Rio Tinto, Chemtura, Alstom, Honeywell SM, DuPont, Jotun, BASF, etc. Ms. Jiang is good at in-depth analysis, strategic research, and is strong in chemical research.

Mr. Oliver has over 20 years of market research management experience, both in China and the United States, supervising projects for leading multi-national organizations such as Arkema, BASF, DSM, DuPont, Jotun, Lubrizol, Johnson Matthey, and many others.

There still exists an urgent need for an efficient, fast, stable and safe crosslinking strategy to develop waterborne polymers for wood coatings with improved mechanical preperties, water and chemical resistance, thermal resistance and scrubability etc. Recently, click chemistry, especially the copper-catalyzed 1, 3-dipolar cycloaddition of azides and alkynes has been studied. The reaction of azide and alkyne is insensitive to oxygen, water and solvents, and can be performed at room temperature. The reaction proceeds with high yields and the reaction rate is greatly faster than that of previous crosslinking reaction. Clickable alkyne or azide containing monomers were synthesized and introduced into waterborne polymers structure to create novel types of waterborne polymers with side-chain alkyne or azide groups. These groups were capable of undergoing clickable crosslinking reaction with the waterborne polymers with side-chain azide groups, which simultaneously improved the overall properties of films made from waterborne polymers for wood coatings.

Prof. Jianqing Hu is currently an associate professor of the South China University of Technology. His main research interest includes synthesis of polymers for coatings and adhesive, degradable materials and biomaterials. He conducted his research work in the University of Leeds, UK from 2007 to 2008. He then worked as postdoctoral research fellow from 2013 to 2015 in the Pennsylvania State University.

Latest Innovations of wood coatings, including formaldehyde-free, high hardness and high transparency anti-scuff waterborne coatings, will be presented.

Mr. Nick Barbounis is the current Asia Pacific RD&I Director for AkzoNobel Wood Finishes & Adhesives.
He holds a bachelor of Applied Science degree in Chemistry attained at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. He has 27 years working experience in coating industry, including 25 years of experience in water borne and UV formulating. He also has vast experience in application equipment and project management.

Ms. Beth Bei works as Product Manager for AkzoNobel Wood Finishes & Adhesives.
With 14 years of experience in sales, marketing and product management, she accumulated rich experience in Customer Value driven innovation and new product development. Beth earned a bachelor degree in Chemical Engineering and Technology from East China University of Science and Technology, and a MBA from Shanghai International Studies University.