Reflecting the trend in the European and the US paint/coatings market, there has been a slow but perceptible shift from solvent to water-based or high-solid coatings in China.

This augurs well for the paint additives market, since more additives with various functions will be required to compensate for the reduced amount of solvent applied.

With the top 10 global coating manufacturers having entered the Chinese market with their classic formulations and high-grade as well as high-performance coatings, Chinese coating counterparts have been encouraged to significantly increase the use of additives. This improved use has impelled the market to hike not only its volume of production, but also to enhance its technologies and functions.

The tremendous rise in the coatings production volume is very likely to cause a consequent increase in the use of paint additives. In 2004, the Chinese paint market had nearly 8000 coatings producers that were rolling out 3798900tonnes of product. This has benefited all additive segments of rheology modifiers, preservatives, as well as dispersants and wetting, flow/levelling and flatting, foam control, driers and catalysts, and film forming agents.

China’s booming economy has also contributed in great measure to the development of industries such as real estate, automotive and infrastructure reconstruction, which in turn, will drive coating applications and therefore, paint additives that improve coatings properties and applications significantly. The Beijing Olympics 2008 and Shanghai Expos 2010 are expected to give a further fillip to the Chinese economy in future.

As coatings formulations expand to include various applications, environmental concerns will simultaneously increase. The growing consciousness among the Chinese about the quality, credibility, health and environmental compliance of coatings has made consumers gravitate towards efficient, easy to handle and environment-friendly products.

This has generated significant demand for low volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions from coatings and environmentally safe paints that are either water-based or have high solids content, depending on the application.

Such moves toward environment-friendly formulations are expected to drive the additives market, since these paints need a larger amount of paint additives than traditional solvent-based coatings.

In 2004, China experienced substantial decline in investment in steel, aluminium, cement and real estate. Subsequently, affiliated coating segments including automotive and coil coatings were adversely affected, which had a resultant impact on the additives market. 

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