American dream for Italian firm Colmec

ERJ staff report (TP)

Moscow – Italian company Colmec, a manufacturer of extrusion lines for rubber and silicone compounds, was at the Tires & Rubber Exhibition to talk Russian markets, European enterprise and American aspirations.

Last week, ERJ spoke with Claudio Caccia, Sales Manager, in the show’s bustling Expocentre.

“We’re number one worldwide for silicone extrusion,” he said.

“We specialise in the extrusion of rubber and make hoses for automobiles and industrial applications.

“Now we are introducing something in the mixing room for silicone, which we patented some years ago – a machine called the CTM – conical twin mixer.

“That is one of our best sales and we have already sold 100 of these machines worldwide – some of them in Russia. We sold this kind of equipment to the major silicone manufacturers worldwide.”

He felt the Russian show had been good, despite the fact they “do very little in tires”. The firm has been present in the country for many years and has been at this particular show for ten years.

Colmec’s plans for the future are very clear.

“We are present almost everywhere, but 80 percent within the European market (considering Russia is part of Europe).

“We have opened a division in the United States and are planning to be more concentrated in that market.

“India is of some interest but the economy is not so stable, so our main effort is on the USA.

“Being an Italian company we made probably 90 percent in exports this year. The Italian market is too flat. We also have overseas investments in South America.

“We introduced this new mixing unit, but we will also introduce this mixing facility more and more for rubber.

“For the time being it’s mainly been for silicone, but luckily we made a decision to invest a lot in R&D. We have a laboratory unit in our factory for five complete industrial lines.

“All of these lines are available for our customers to do their trials with their own compounds.

“Probably 80 percent of our sales comes through this laboratory.”