Leader in resins LERG

LEADER IN RESINS

LERG, from Pustków in Poland, is a renowned manufacturer and exporter of synthetic resins used in diverse industrial sectors. The company attaches the utmost importance to maintaining the highest quality standards and continuing to adjust its production profile to emerging customer needs, in Poland and abroad. Piotr Sadowski reports.

LERG manufactures resins using a number of base raw materials, such as urea, methanol, phenol, melamine, glycols and styrene. The resulting products serve a variety of industrial sectors and for that reason seasonality occurs, whereby different resins tend to be in higher demand than others. “In recent years the strongest area of our activity has been the production of polyester resins and novolac,” explains Agnieszka Kozubek-Bespalenko, the vice-president of the board at LERG. “According to IHS Chemical Research, we are the leading manufacturer of unsaturated polyester resins in central and eastern Europe.” The company’s turnover is currently PLN 400 million and has been steadily growing over the years. LERG also owns 63 hectares of land, which offers it excellent opportunities for further expansion of its production infrastructure. Diversified offer

The company’s annual volume of sales exceeds 100,000 tonnes and every year, depending on the different groups of resins, LERG undertakes significant investments in modernising and innovating. “We invest in cutting-edge solutions for measuring and dispensing of raw materials,” explains Ms Kozubek-Bespalenko. “Bearing in mind such high sales volumes, it is also important to continuously develop our storage facilities. Furthermore, when erecting new installations, we use the highest-quality materials as this ultimately enables a fully reliable production of resins. As a result of all such activities, our production capacity is constantly expanding, and in the case of certain product groups dedicated installations are operating at near 100 per cent capacity. We are also gaining new customers

every year which gives us additional incentives for further expanding our production plant.”

With such strong manufacturing abilities, it is not surprising that LERG occupies a leading position in delivering a wide variety of resins, selling to a total of 29 countries worldwide. In addition to the before-mentioned polyester and novolac resins the company produces alkyd resins (which meet the relevant VOC environmental norms), phenol and urea resins for plywood or fibreboards. LERG also enjoys a strong share in the European market for resole resins for rock wool and especially in Germany there is a strong demand for the company’s phenol resins for impregnating paper or plastic panels. “As a company that is highly flexible in its cooperation with business partners, we are always ready to modify our existing products as well as introduce new ones,” confirms the vice-president. “Using our own and external research facilities, we introduce around 100 new products every year.” Working across many markets

LERG offers its products to customers throughout Europe and its clients include large, international consortia, leaders in their own industrial sectors. The company’s resins are used in the production of tyres, rock wool, sewage pipes, laminates, boats, fluid tanks, break pads and many other items. LERG’s customers thus include companies whose names are familiar throughout the European continent. “We export 50 per cent of our

SKAMER ACM

SKAMER ACM has 25 years of experience in broadly defined industrial automation.

Our scope of business includes: • Design, software, installation, consulting, starting and servicing • Sales of the automation components, electrical equipment and industrial fittings • AUTOMATION CATALOG is IT system (www.katalogautomatyki.pl), which automates the flow of technical and commercial information between SKAMER and cooperating companies. The system allows you to: compare the products with similar characteristics from different manufacturers; create specifications, offers and orders; participate online in training and exhibitions.

Our group of customers includes virtually all plants from the southern part of Poland. LERG SA Pustkow is one of our key customers. We have cooperated with them for many years, during which we have proved to be a reliable partner in implementation and application of automation. In recent years we have accomplished the modernization of instrumentation for raw materials storage facility as well as control system for loading and unloading raw materials. Earlier, we installed instrumentation for the aminoplast line and modernized the set for novolak resins production.

Solvadis polska sp. z o.o.

Solvadis polska sp. z o.o. has been present on the Polish market for almost 20 years. Several years of experience and continuous growth have stabilized our position in the industry making us one of key business entities involved in distribution of chemical raw materials as well as industrial and specialist chemistry including base chemistry.

The company’s main distinguishing feature is an extensive and diversified portfolio of technologically advanced and continuously improved products such as chemistry of plastics, products for paint and varnish industry, building chemistry, biofuels and oils, washing and agents for food industry and agriculture, disinfecting agents, oils, lubricants and base and organic chemistry cleaning agents. Solvadis polska provides complex customer service ensuring professional technical assistance and after sale support.

The company is actively engaged in the industry as a member of key organisations gathering leaders in the chemical market such as The Polish Chamber of Chemical Industry or The Polish Aerosol Federation. Solvadis polska has been awarded several prestigious ‘Gazela Biznesu’ awards, awarded by the most popular business magazine in the country Puls Biznesu to the most dynamically developing companies in Poland. The ISO 9001:2008 Quality Certificate confirms that solvadis polska meets the quality management requirements for sale, distribution and marketing in trading chemical substances. The company is also a holder of the Highest Quality Certificate awarded by the Wielkopolskie Quality Research Association under the auspices of the Ministry of Economics and the Company President - Elisabeth Lürenbaum has been awarded the title of the Highest Quality Manager. Obtaining the REDcert Certificate for application of sustainable development policy in production of bio-fuels meeting the UE standards is one of the most important company’s recent achievements. The company aims at marketing chemical products used in more ecological production processes and product managers are involved in educational activities offering their customers more environment friendly alternative solutions.

products and the largest foreign market for us is Germany,” adds Ms Kozubek-Bespalenko. “Our western neighbour is then followed by the Czech Republic, Ukraine, Italy and Spain, and, as many of our clients are international market players, this means that our resins are effectively also used outside of Europe.”

The company sees potential in continuing to expand its activities in the export markets in which it currently operates. It plans to further develop sales of polyester resins in Germany and for that reason will be exhibiting its products at the Composites Europe Trade Fair in Düsseldorf, which takes place at the beginning of October 2012. Also this year, LERG is planning to launch cooperation with a trading partner in Germany, which would become the company’s direct distributor for that market, supplying LERG’s products to smaller customers in the country.

Ongoing growth

Polish legislation in the area of resin manufacturing means that any investment process takes a long time. Despite this, LERG has already started working on expanding its current offer to include products never before manufactured by the company. If all goes according to plan, innovative offerings for a new group of customers will be available from 2014 onwards. “In addition to organic growth, we are also seriously considering acquisitions in order to further expand our business, particularly as competition is currently somewhat weaker,” admits Ms Kozubek-Bespalenko. “Nevertheless, we approach any major growth decisions with the safety of our customers being our number one priority. Recent times have been rather unfavourable for producers of resins and while sales volumes have been high, financial results were not so good. The crisis is evident and so investing in different directions might be risky. What is certain, however, is that LERG will continue investing in new production lines in its factory and expand its distribution channel in Germany. We are recognised as a highly reliable and financially stable company and so the clear message which we want to send to our customers is that we are a stable partner in these difficult times.” n