through product introductions with brands like Imlar, Duxone
and Challenger.
Rodriguez: This year will be quite difficult, as we have a new
government that has to adjust a series of macro and micro economic problems that the previous administration left.
We presume that the first half of this year’s sales may slow
down, compared to previous years and hope we will end 2016
with a very little growth.
CW: In what areas are you focusing your
R&D efforts?
Büchner: Our main focus is to continue to deliver sustainable
innovations with clear customer benefits in terms of energy savings and well-being.
A great example of one of our more recent innovations is
Dulux Easycare. Featuring stain repellent technology, it’s an
interior paints which enables you to easily clean common
household stains off your walls without worrying about damaging the surface. Easycare highlights how we are continuing
to meet growing demand from consumers for more sustainable solutions. Many of our products and solutions lead to less
energy use for our customers. Another example in Intersleek,
an antifouling paint which makes ships’ hulls smoother, resulting in less drag, which means less fuel is needed and there are
fewer emissions.
Falder: High-performance coatings and business areas. We are
engaged in a range of areas including graphene research, high
performance waterborne and a wide range of forward-looking
industrial applications to try and give commercial advantage
to our key accounts. Color styling and color trending work
has become increasingly important for our automotive OEM
customers where our speed of response and small batch sizes
are appropriate.
Kamieth: We continuously develop new products and processes
in order to ensure highest quality for our customers and to help
our customers become more successful. Especially the demand
for sustainable and environmentally friendly solutions is significantly increasing. Consequently, we are increasing the share of
R&D investment for sustainable solutions even further. Another
key focus area is digitalization. We are convinced that digitalization will enable us to identify new business models and to optimize costs, for instance, in the area of development, production,
and logistics. Digitalization will clearly change almost all areas
of our value chain within the next years.
McGarry: We see a variety of high-level trends that are driving
growth across each segment, and where we are focusing our
research investments. One key driver for research and development investment is energy. Changes in energy are driving a
revolution in the materials and processes used to manufacture
