Good News, Bad News

January/February 2011 — Good news: the Glass Industry survived the last two years which was the most difficult period in recent history. Bad news: nevertheless, many furnaces, even complete plants, had to be shut down in order to cope with the decreasing glass demand. Especially in Western Europe, glass consumption dropped by about 8% in 2009. The worst was Eastern Europe with a drop of about 12%, really bad news.

But there is also really good news now: in 2010 we saw a turnaround. The market grew globally by 3.3%, strongly driven by Asia. Good news for China, bad news for the rest of the world, half of the worldwide growth is coming from China! No region in the world is growing faster than this huge market where the growth rate is nearly double digits!

The other regions are growing slower, but they are still growing. In Western Europe, for example, we have seen a growth of about 3% in 2010. That’s the good news. The bad news: the growth in the developed countries has not accelerated enough to make up for the decrease in 2009.There is still a long way to go before the Glass Industry will reach the level of 2007/2008 in these regions.

well because many investments were put on hold or postponed, bad news for us. However the good news for our customers is that we did not slow down or reduce our investment in research and development. As a result, we were able to show a record number of new products at Glasstec 2010, including retrofits and upgrades, new inspection and monitoring technologies, and also revolutionary developments like our BIS machine or closed loop systems.Of course, Emhart Glass was affected by the crisis as

And the very best news: the Glass Industry will grow even stronger in 2011. Experts expect a growth rate of 4.2%. Again, the rate without China is expected to be 2.8%, but this is double compared to 2010.

This growth is good enough to encourage the revitalization of many projects which were on hold and the investment in new projects. The Glass Industry is starting to invest again and Emhart Glass can offer new attractive products for these investments. Good news!

                                                                                                                                                                                     – Martin Jetter, President

Learn more about Emhart Glass Products by contacting your Emhart Glass representative.

Please forward inquiries and comments to: Glass.Tidings@emhartglass.com