no exception. This affects the various companies differently.
The large conglomerates gain by economies of scale and the
small- to mid-sized companies benefit from dedicated customer
service, enhanced agility, and innovative product introductions.
Generally, I would say, 2016 was a good year for the industrial
coatings industry.
Markus Kamieth: The majority of BASF’s global Coatings sales
relate to the automotive sector; as such, we benefit from the
robust growth in automobile production, particularly in Asia-Pacific, North America and Europe. Although the market in
South America still showed steep declines, we are optimistic at
the first signs of recovery in 2017.
Charles Shaver: Looking globally, we saw trends year over
year consistent with last year. The refinish business in North
America continued to consolidate among body shops as multi-
shop operators extended their reach. Asia-Pacific showed mod-
erate growth in line with GDP trends and, in spite of the focus
on the “new normal” in China, the market continues to provide
a strong customer base for refinish and for both transportation
and industrial OEMs. India displayed solid growth consistent
with its strengthening GDP and stabilized currency. Markets
in the EU displayed moderate growth of one to two percent
as expected. Latin America’s story is well known as markets
continue to contract in general and the impact of foreign ex-
change translation is greater than the effect of the strong dollar
alone. However, we’ve been aggressive in the region introducing
new products with good quality at affordable prices and by pro-
viding customers with creative services such as our new mobile
training platform for refinish technicians.
CW: Did your company see an increase in
revenue in 2016?
Andersen: Since the 2016 annual result won’t be published until
April, I can’t give you a complete answer. But what I can say is
that 2016 was a very good year for Hempel, focusing on leadership, execution and not at least our customers, in line with our
2020 strategy Journey to Excellence.
Büchner: We achieved record
levels of profitability in 2016
and are making further steps in
delivering on our strategy of continuous improvement and growth. Our financial discipline also
improved cash generation and our current share buyback program reinforces our confidence in this moving forward. We have
structurally improved our ability to respond to developments in
our markets and are better able to seize growth opportunities,
