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Zoltek Europe GmbH
Römerstr. 1a
85445 Oberding
Germany
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In the world of materials, carbon fiber is emerging as the ultimate team player - one that works miracles in reinforcing other materials and lifting them to new levels of performance.
At Zoltek Companies, Inc., we view our role in a similar light.
Our mission as a company is to lead the commercialization of carbon fiber as a primary composite building material. To do that, we are building joint venture and team relationships with companies in other industries and in other parts of the world. It is our goal to help others to achieve new levels of performance across a range of products. Carbon fiber-reinforced composites are remarkable in their performance characteristics and properties that include high strength, low weight, high stiffness, corrosion resistance, heat resistance, and electrical conductivity. Carbon fiber possesses another important characteristic. It is remarkably versatile in its ability to work with an assortment of different materials, including other fibers, plastics, metals, wood and concrete. As a result of this versatility, it is impossible to postulate all of the potential uses of carbon fiber in maximizing performance and lowering life-cycle costs across a range of consumer and industrial products, and across all types of construction. Zoltek makes carbon fiber through a proprietary continuous carbonization process. Back in 1995, when we had only a single production line, we succeeded in driving costs down to the point where we were able to quote a price of $8 per pound for substantial quantities of carbon fiber, while maintaining an attractive profit margin.
This price point proved to be a major jumping off point for stimulating new interest and demand across a variety of industries. Moreover, we became convinced that it was well within our power to make further reductions in cost and price, which could truly open the floodgates of demand across a variety of industries. We therefore announced our intention of quoting a price of $5 per pound for substantial users by the year 2000. However, none of this would have mattered without a parallel commitment - which we also made - to ensure a plentiful supply of low-priced carbon fiber. Otherwise, we could not expect customers to make large commitments of their own, in re-engineering products, or creating new ones, to take advantage of the exceptional properties of carbon fiber. During 1997 and 1998, with the opening of new continuous carbonization lines, we boosted our capacity for producing high-performance carbon fiber from 3.5 million pounds to 12.5 million pounds a year. In doing so, we became the world leader in rated capacity for producing carbon fiber. And we are continuing to expand rapidly. We plan to raise our total capacity to about 40 million pounds by the year 2002. To put that into perspective, consider that total world production in the year 1997 amounted to approximately 30 million pounds for all carbon fiber manufacturers combined. Thus, we have made substantial progress in the first two elements of a three-part strategy-first, in driving down costs and prices; and second, in leading a massive increase in productive capacity. Now we are increasingly concentrating on the third, and decisive, element in our strategy: working with other companies to open new applications and markets made possible by the ready availability of low-priced carbon fibers.
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