SPE Central Europe has announced a new sponsor: Solvay Speciality Polymers will support an award category at the 20th Automotive Award 2021. According to SPE Central Europe, Solvay contributes with innovative and competitive solutions to meet today's and tomorrow's requirements in a wide range of areas, while at the same time conserving the resources of our planet. The Automotive Award of SPE Central Europe is awarded to innovative vehicle parts and components made of plastic.

The digital FK Conference 2020, offered by the German company Fecken-Kirfel GmbH & Co. KG, a specialist in the manufacture of customised splitting and stacking machines for the plastics, rubber and cork industry, will take place from 8 – 10 December 2020. A total of six presentations in English will inform about trends and current new developments. Interested parties can register to participate at the event from mid-November 2020 via the website www.fecken-kirfel.de. For the entire duration of the conference, participants also have the option of individual video conferences.

SaarGummi Group and the Japanese weatherstrip supplier Tokai Kogyo Co Ltd. have signed a wide-reaching technical agreement. The companies have been in contact since the beginning of 2018. In addition to a strategic partnership, the focus of the cooperation is above all the exchange of technology between the Japanese and German company.

Evonik announced that construction work on its largest investment to date – at more than EUR 400 million – is progressing well. The first plant at the site in Marl, Germany, was completed on schedule in mid-October 2020 and is currently being commissioned. Further plants will follow by Q1 2021, with full completion expected in H1 2021.

IMCD N.V., a distributor of speciality chemicals and ingredients, announced the opening of its new US headquarters in Westlake, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland. IMCD said that the company debuts its new location to accommodate its expanding business, invest in its people and future growth, plus complement its global digitalisation initiatives to better serve its markets across the USA.

Styrenics Circular Solutions (SCS), a value chain initiative to increase the circularity of styrenics, announced that it has successfully demonstrated that polystyrene is mechanically recyclable to food contact standards. In cooperation with the Fraunhofer-Institute für Verfahrenstechnik und Verpackung IVV, SCS performed so-called challenge tests, which confirmed the high cleaning efficiency of the mechanical recycling technology for polystyrene to remove impurities originating from waste streams. These results enable the first application for an opinion of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) on the use of recycled polystyrene (r-PS) as food contact material.

The first digital in-house exhibition called Xpert Forum of Klöckner Desma Elastomertechnik GmbH in Fridingen, Germany, took place from 6 – 30 October 2020. For more than 25 years the company has been organising a two-day open house event every three years, which has established itself internationally as a meeting point for the industry.

On 3 November 2020, JEC Group announced that due to the continued impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and after thorough consultation of clients and partners, the next edition of JEC World is postponed from 9 – 11 March to 1 – 3 June 2021 at Paris Nord Villepinte.

Otto Krahn Group GmbH announced on 2 November 2020 that from now it will operate as the holding company of the globally active Otto Krahn Group. It will in future define the strategic guidelines and at the same time take on the role of a professional service provider to support Group companies with the development of successful and sustainable growth strategies.

With the COVID pandemic continuing to have a detrimental impact on corporate travel, Smithers has decided to move their established industry event TPE & Silicone Elastomers World Summit 2020 to an online format. The new event will take place on the afternoons of 15-16 December, and delegates will still be able to move between both TPE and silicone online presentations by purchasing one Elastomers World Summit ticket.