Invista to increase production of airbag material

To help meet continued demand driven by growth of the global airbag market, INVISTA, one of the airbag industry’s leading suppliers, has developed plans to invest in multiple projects within the next five to seven years across its global industrial nylon yarn manufacturing network.

Coming on the heels of recently announced expansions in Qingpu, China, and Gloucester, United Kingdom, INVISTA is planning to add another seven kilotons of spinning capacity at its Kingston, Canada facility. Start-up of these latest assets is expected in the second quarter of 2012.

“Our customers have sent us a very clear message that their demand is increasing across the world, which creates a need for us to invest in capital equipment – potentially in the hundreds of millions of dollars,” said John Barnes, INVISTA global business director for industrial nylon products. “These efforts will help us to support our customers’ needs to secure access to this important raw material.”

Barnes continued, “We are currently working closely with major airbag system manufacturers to understand their needs. The design work for the Kingston expansion is largely complete, and assuming continued strong market demand, construction can begin in the second half of 2011.”

Jeff Brown, vice president of INVISTA performance materials, explained that the rapid execution around this particular investment is quite novel. “By utilizing innovative equipment design and construction techniques, our teams have developed creative options to allow us to rapidly replicate our existing machine technology,” said Brown. “These efforts should allow INVISTA to complete this project in roughly half of the time of a typical design-and-build program.”