The bottleneck in intermediate development

Elementary reactions like sulfonation,nitration,reduction,mainly use traditional technology.The lack of variety and similar quality of the products from intermediate industry bring the fierce competition and price-cutting for sale competition.Domestic dye intermediate manufactors remain on small scale and simple organization structure.So there are few firms form the economic of scale.

According to the statistic,there are about 2000 types of dyestuff produced domestically,and about 800 types of these are produced all year around.The output of the intermediates are 60,000 tons.Look from the varieties,there are about 160 kinds of intermediates produced for export,most of which are benzene series (50%) and Naphthalene series(26%).And anthraquinone and heterocyklische Reihe repectively account for 14% and 10%.

Presently,the industry of dyestuffs intermediates has gained some achivement, but there are still several problems in it like poor quality of some of the dye intermediates,relatively low-technology and the inadequate research and development of dye intermediates.All of these are needed to be improved.

First,the technological innovative ability and the input of research and development of the new products are not enough to develop new products and make them industrialized.In particular,there are some weaknesses on the technology and process of manufacturing.Without the improvement of the technology and process,the gap of quality index and availability are still exiting between our firms and foreign firms.

The second problem is the market.The market is the key point of the industry. Currently,the lack of variety and similar quality of the products from intermediate industry bring the fierce competition and price-cutting for sale competition.Presently, the scale of the firms producing intermediates are various.Most of them are medium or small firms,and few of them are large-scale owned by state or state-controlled.So the industry is faced with the issue of reallocation of resource.The competition in the market is increasing.

The last issue is the product mix.Most of the dye intermediates produced domestically are products with low additional value.Part of the raw materials and intermediates are still relying on import.All the issues are resulting from the small scale and simple organization structure of the firms producing dye intermediates. Without the economic strenth and the investment on research and development,the product mix become similar and most of the products are poor quality with low additional value.So,compared to the dye intermediates manufactors based on foreign countries,domestic manufactors are lack of competitiveness.

To solve these problems:

The first and foremost,the input of the reserch and development should be increased.From now on,our manufactors should enhance the reserch and development,emphasize on the developing of the fluorine-containing dye intermediate and other intermediates that can not be produced domestically.We should speed up the launching of new products with high additional value,the development of the process of cleaner production and the development of efficient utilization of the resource,to fulfill the requirement of the adjustment of the product mix,narrow the gap with foreign manufactors and accomplish the sustainable development eventually.

Then,we should accelerate the industrial consolidation.Recent years,the speed development of the dye intermediates industry attract lots of investors,the firms producing dye intermediates have sprung up throughout the country.This trend result in the great number of the manufactors,the relatively small scale of the firms and the low competiveness.Therefore,we should develop toward large firms through industrial consoidation and selecting survival of the fittest.On one hand,more resource and investment are input to the superior firms and acchive the economic scale;on the other hand,the input of the research will be enhanced,the core competiveness will be risen.

At last,an investigation of the industry should be first.This is a very important step to boot the development of the industry.Because,at the economic globalization era,out firms are faced with not ony the traditional opponents,but also the various service and products from competitors from all over the world.The supply for the market is no longer the problem when profit is enough,however which firm can grasp the demand of the market is important.So,the information gathering and the analysis of the market of the dye intermediate industry can not be ignored. Manufactors should focus on the development status of the world heading dye manufactors.and conduct the continuous and systematic analysis of the dye market through the developing,promptly comprehensive and systematic investigation of the dye intermediates.With the comprehensive analysis,find out the major products, analyze the potential requirement of different customs,learn about the exiting and potential competitors,capture the target market,analyze and develop the strategy to occupy the target market with the fastest speed.

By Xu Xiyi