Coatings World - April 2013

CoatingsTech 2013
Focuses on Innovation
Bridget Klebaur, Associate Editor

focused mostly on the North American industry and financial perspectives as well as the role of innovation and the future of the entire industry.

“I’ll highlight the four largest companies in North America, and discuss how they’ve led the way; PPG, Sherwin-Williams, panies performed relative to the SMP 500.

“Over that time period, if you had invested $100 in these four
companies, your return would have increased 315%. The ten-year
return during that time for the SMP 500 was only double,” Arnold
added. “So we’re in a really good industry. You can see the type of
profitability, the type of growth we’ve experienced over an incredibly
long period of time. And we might be mired in some of the trans-
formation that we’ve needed to make in the last few years, but as
Ramesh pointed out in the opening, we’re really moving forward.”
First place for The Roon Award went to Kamakshi
Christopher, Asian Paints, with second place going to Erik

The CoatingsTech conference was held at the Hyatt Regency O’Hare Hotel in Rosemont, IL on March 11-13, 2013. The theme of the conference was“Leaps and Bounds: Reenergizing the Coatings Industry,” and was put together by the American Coatings Association. The ACA Coatings Tech task force put together the conference with the goal of focusing on innovative trends in the coatings industry, research and development, and practical applications in the world of coatings. The conference was sponsored by Air Products, BYK USA Inc., American Elements, Emerald Performance Materials and Specialty Polymers Inc., and featured 14 exhibitors.

The conference featured talks on many topics, including Corrosion & Protective Coatings, Bio-based Coatings, Additives and Pigments, Regulations & Analytical Methods, Functional Coatings, Mattiello Symposium, Weathering/Durability, and Waterborne.

There were also three short courses held on Monday, March 11 on Science and Technology of Coatings Formulation, Pigment and Dispersion Technology, and Natural and Accelerated Weathering of Coatings, which was hosted by SSPC: The Society for Protective Coatings.

The welcome address was given by Ramesh Subramarian, CoatingsTech conference task force chair, Nuplex Resins LLC, and was followed by the keynote address by Cynthia Arnold, senior VP and chief technology officer, The Valspar Corporation. Arnold’s address, “Profitability and Growth: Differentiated Business Practices of the Strongest Companies,”