news

It’s showtime in Shanghai forPM Asia 2007

4 MPR March 2007 metal-powder.net

PM ASIA 2007 opens in Shanghai next month and the plenary sessions will delegates a comprehensive picture of the PM industry in China, setting the tone of the three-day event. The sessions range across structural parts, ferrous and copper powder and the diamond tooling industry. China’s cemented carbide and magnet indus-tries – already substantial in terms of global resource and production will also be dealt with.

Ni Guancao director of the Shanghai Powder Metallurgy Works, and Director General of the PM Association of China Machinery Parts Society

will not only tell delegates about structural parts and their production, but also set industrial production in the context of China’s 11th Five Year Plan 2006 – 2010.

Professor Jianmin Cui, head of Laiwu Iron and Steel Group Powder Metallurgy Co Ltd, and president of the PM Association of Steel Construction, China, will also take a broad brush approach to encompass his analysis of ferrous and copper powder production.

The growing global appe-tite for magnets and China’s role in providing for that demand will be addressed by Professor Luo Yang, a voting

member representing China on the Institution of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, in his presentation on the indus-try’s current status and future prospects.

The world has long recog-nised that China holds a large proportion of the world’s raw tungsten; only more latterly has the realisation dawned that China also has a cement-ed carbide manufacturing industry capable of competing very successfully in global markets.

Delegates will learn more of that from the presentation by Li Zheng from the Zhuzhou Cemented Carbide Group, a giant among the Chinese

companies that make up the industry, when he looks towards the future develop-ment of the industry.

Hard materials and future development will also form the core of the talk on dia-mond tooling by Professor Xiyu Luo from the Central Iron & Steel Research Institute in Beijing.

Distinguished PM academ-ics are also a feature of the International business com-munity’s contribution to the conference, with keynotes by leading lights such as Professor Randall German of Mississippi State University and Professor Cetin Morris Sonsino, of Fraunhofer in Germany.

GKN closes outexcess capacityGKN Sinter Metals is to close its automotive PM parts plant in Worcester, Massachusetts, by the autumn. The 158,000 sq ft facility employs has about 150 people.

GKN purchased the busi-ness, formerly known as the PresMet Corporation, in 2001 from the Boorky family trust when PresMet had about 350 employees and reported sales of $36 million. The PM opera-tion was founded in 1944 by Morris Boorky, his brother Harry E Boorky, and Carl G Johnson, then a professor at one of the USA well known PM centres, theWorcester Polytechnic Institute. GKN origi-nally purchased the business in

1972 but sold it back to Morris Boorky in 1980.

A GKN spokesperson says the closing decision was based on overcapacity in North America and loss of vol-ume. The Worcester Telegram & Gazette reported that GKN has invested about $14.8 million in the plant, mostly for equipment. City officials will seek to decertify a tax-break arrangement whereby GKN received a reduction of increased taxes from the added value to the property. During the past three years GKN has also closed three PM parts plants in Owosso, Zeeland, and Romulus, Michigan.

Spring meet atPenn StateTHE Spring CISP Industry Members Meeting will be held at the Days Inn Penn State in State College on April 9 and 10 and a new year full of collaboration and opportuni-ties will be presented and discussed.

The Center for Innovative Sintered Products meeting kicks off a week of Penn State meetings where representa-tives of government laborato-ries, academia and industry will showcase their research. This includes Materials Day (April 10-11) sponsored by the Materials Research Institute and then the Inaugural Meeting of the Ben Franklin Center of Excellence in

Structural Health Monitoring (April 12-13).

Materials Day is an annual event at Penn State with over 300 faculty, students and guests gathered to discuss the latest advances and trends in materials research. The University says: “This is an opportunity for you and colleagues from your com-pany to attend presentations from government laborato-ries, academia and industry on nanoscience and nanote-chnology."

The upcoming Materials Day will be April 10-11, 2007 and registration may be found at: http://www.mri.psu.edu/materialsday/.

News_Layout 4News_Layout 4 16/03/2007 11:05:0816/03/2007 11:05:08