Control of the North American oriented films industry moves East

10-Jul-13

There was a time when North American owned film producers led the world in terms of production capacity and product development in bi-oriented films but today the industry is now largely in the hands of Asian owners, according to leading consultants to the industry, PCI Films Consulting. Representing just 8.5% of total world film extrusion capacity in 2012 for BOPP, BOPET and BOPA films, North American oriented film producers, for some time have been slow to invest and are now unable to fulfil the region’s domestic needs resulting in increasing volumes of North America’s demand for oriented films being met by imports. As a result, much of the domestic film extrusion capacity is of an age that requires significant investment in order to compete with the imports from low cost producers in other markets. It is not surprising therefore that some US owners have decided to withdraw from the market, rather than make the necessary investment, but where does this leave their customers?