In recent years, the rapid development of Asia's shipbuilding industry has prompted the revitalization of the shipbuilding accessories industry. Ship coatings, as an important raw and auxiliary material in shipbuilding, has gradually become a key development project for coating companies. With the increasing demand and huge market potential, the marine coatings industry has entered a golden period of rapid development.

Struggling to cross the middle and high-end market threshold

Since 2002, the Asian marine coatings market has grown steadily, with an average annual growth rate of 6% to 8%. Asia currently occupies almost 60% of the global marine coatings market. Correspondingly, the concentration of jetties in Asia is also high, and the maintenance of ships also requires a large amount of paint.

However, as the world's largest paint producing and consuming country, China's marine paint products have for many years been irrelevant to some of China's large shipping companies. A person in charge of a ship coating company in Ningbo, which has a history of more than 50 years, said that the annual sales revenue of the company’s marine coatings exceeds 100 million yuan, but the customers are mainly shipbuilding companies and ship owners with weaker capabilities. The relatively large shipbuilding enterprises in Jiangsu, Shandong, and Anhui, where the shipbuilding industry is relatively developed, have all adopted foreign brand coatings. The person in charge of supplies of a ship company in Anhui said that he had taken over the procurement of goods for five years and the company had never purchased domestic-made ship coatings.

What are the reasons for the difficulty of domestically produced marine coatings entering the domestic high-end market?

According to the analysis of the person in charge of some shipping companies’ materials and materials departments, users are not assured that quality and service are one of the reasons. At present, domestic shipping companies are afraid to let go and promote the use of domestic-made ship coatings, mainly because the overall quality of domestic ship coatings still needs further improvement, and domestic ship coating companies lack the support of a global service network.

A senior ship designer pointed out that at present, domestically constructed high-end and high-end ships are generally export ships, and they have long been operating on international routes. In the course of sailing, if ships need to be repaired, they are looking for a nearby ship repairing company near the port. This requires that supporting materials, including paints, be obtained in the nearest place so that the ship can complete the docking as quickly as possible and put it into operation as soon as possible. Judging from the current situation, China's ship coating companies do not have the ability to provide global service support. The deputy general manager of a shipping company in Jiangsu that has paid over one million deadweight tons per year also believes that at present, most domestic-made marine coatings do not provide inspection reports that are authoritative in the world. This makes it difficult to convince ship owners, especially It is a foreign shipowner.

Liang Xinfang, chairman of Zhejiang Yutong Advanced Paint & Coatings Co., Ltd., stated that although domestic ship coating companies still have the problem of “low, small, and scattered”, with the rapid development of the shipbuilding industry in recent years, some domestic paint companies are in product quality. And the production scale has been greatly improved. It is difficult for Chinese-made marine coatings to enter the domestic high-end market. Although there are quality and global service factors, the most important is the lack of fair opportunities for competing with foreign brands on the same platform. He pointed out that at present, some large and medium-sized shipbuilding enterprises in China generally adopt the form of bidding and bidding when purchasing ship coatings. However, the objects of their bidding and bidding are mainly international famous ship coating brands, and most domestic paint companies have difficulty in obtaining this. Qualifications, to a certain extent, dampened their enthusiasm for stronger products.

In order to cross the threshold of the high-end market as soon as possible, domestic ship coating companies must make every effort to improve the quality of their products, increase their efforts in international certification of products, set up their own service networks through various channels, and march into the high-end market.

Efforts to resolve obstacles to development

At the annual meeting of the Chinese coatings and paints industry in 2011, Sun Lianying, president of the China Coatings Industry Association, admitted that the complexity of the economic operation of the marine coatings industry in China still exists. Some enterprises’ thinking and understanding are divorced from reality. Many companies’ operating costs, increased pressure on employment, and the difficulty of financing for SMEs have further increased. The industry’s own industrial structure, technological innovation and talent shortage have not been fundamentally resolved.

Sun Lianying pointed out that some enterprises' thinking and understanding are out of touch with reality, and they do not consider the reality that the output of a certain product or specialty is greater than the sales, grasp the market trend and blindly increase or decrease production, and thus enter a vicious cycle of increasing production, lowering prices, and reducing production losses. status.

At present, China's ship coating companies obviously have financing difficulties. In order to prevent overheating of economic development, China's central bank has implemented a series of lock-in liquidity measures since 2010, and has repeatedly raised the deposit reserve ratio of large financial institutions. The increase in the deposit reserve ratio does not directly increase the burden on companies, but it is of great significance in controlling the scale of commercial bank lending. SMEs with unreasonable product structure and poor returns have only received loans. Small and medium-sized enterprises, especially those below the scale, have become more and more aware of the tight funding situation of the start-up companies. Most of the ship coating companies are small and medium-sized enterprises, so this policy has a negative impact on the shipbuilding coatings industry, which is mainly composed of supporting facilities. In addition, the National Development and Reform Commission stipulates in the new catalog of industrial structure adjustment that it is not allowed to newly build a solvent-based paint production line under 3,000 tons, and most of the high-pollution and high-environmental risk products of the paint industry are listed in the “double high” product catalogue. The two policies have further limited the ability of SMEs to produce low-end products and environmental governance is difficult to meet.

The high cost of production factors is also another major unfavorable factor constraining the development of the marine coatings industry. In recent years, cost pressures on the labor force, management costs, and fuel production factors in the paint industry have become increasingly prominent. Especially since 2010, the country has entered a intensive pay period. The paint industry is affected by factors such as the rebound of the market and the increase in labor demand. Enterprises generally increase wages to ease employment difficulties, and labor costs have increased substantially. At the same time, the prices of production factors such as fuel power and raw materials continue to rise. National Bureau of Statistics data show that in 2010 the purchase price index of domestic industrial enterprises' fuel power rose by about 20% year-on-year, and the main raw material of titanium dioxide soared in an unprecedented amount, and the price of ton was close to 30,000 yuan.

The data provided by the Coatings Association shows that in 2010, the product sales cost of 2745 large-scale enterprises in China was 163.38 billion yuan, up 28.5% year-on-year; the product sales cost was 10.936 billion yuan, up 18.1% year-on-year; the management cost was 1.0102 billion yuan, up 20.7% year-on-year. It can be seen that the continuous increase in the management fees and production factor prices has become a prominent issue affecting the operation of the marine coatings industry at this stage. The marine coatings industry must continue to develop healthily and share a slice of the high-end market. It must strive to resolve the above-mentioned contradictions that hinder development.

Accelerate the development of green products

With the development of various marine equipment in the direction of green environmental protection, the marine coatings industry has gradually entered the era of pollution-free green environmental protection. The rapid development of the shipbuilding industry, the increasing degree of mechanization, the shortening of the manufacturing cycle, the user's requirements for the overall performance of ship coatings, surface treatment processes, coating processes and equipment are increasingly high. In the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” paint industry planning, the clean production of the paint industry has become an important part, and the country is paying more and more attention to environmental protection issues. Green has therefore become the direction of development of marine coatings.

In recent years, major marine paint manufacturers are committed to the development of waterborne marine coatings. At the Dalian Maritime Exhibition held at the end of 2010, Jotun Paints' concept of “environmental protection, green, low-carbon” and environment-friendly ship coatings that can save fuel consumption by 40% have been welcomed by many shipbuilding companies and ship owners. After entering the 21st century, the global paint industry is moving toward intensive and professional development, while paint products are developing toward low-pollution, energy-saving, and multi-functional types. Although China's marine coatings have achieved considerable development in recent years, with the promulgation and implementation of new national standards and mandatory standards and conventions of the International Maritime Organization, all relevant research institutes and coating production enterprises should pay more attention to the requirements of the new standards, closely following them. Market situation, increase the development of energy-efficient and environmentally friendly ship coatings, in order to seek a dominant position in the field, enhance their core competitiveness, and promote the development of the marine coatings industry.

Behind the rapid development of the domestic marine coatings industry, it is not difficult for us to see that soaring prices, severe competition, and low technical content have repeatedly highlighted issues.

The development of waterborne marine coatings, increased market competitiveness, increased R&D of high-tech products, and transfer of cost pressures have become the primary issues faced by domestic marine coatings companies. Resolving these issues requires not only the joint efforts of companies and research institutions, but also national standards. Policy support. It is believed that in the near future, under the dual promotion of increased demand and increased technological input, China's marine coatings industry will surely enter the era of pollution-free green environmental protection and the mid-to-high end market.