New Extrusion Equipment Combines U.S. Management with Chinese Production

Uway Extrusion is in many ways the perfect combination of co-founder Dustin Kremer’s family ties to plastics manufacturing and his own interest in running an import export business.

 

Created in 2011 by Kremer and his partner, Will Wood, Uway Extrusion is a manufacturer of film, sheet, and board extrusion systems, as well as compounders and pelletizers, with production based from two sites in China and management located in the U.S.

 

Since its inception roughly three years ago, the company has taken off commercially in 2014, with Kremer estimating Uway has delivered 25 complete extrusion lines from its Shanghai facility this year, with approximately 10 twin-screw extruders delivered every month from its Nanjing complex.

 

Kremer, who graduated from Indiana University in Bloomington in 2005 with a degree in finance, is also a third generation plastics extruder, spending time working for his father and grandfather at Futurex, the custom roll and sheet extruder in Bloomingdale, Ind. founded by his grandfather in 1969.

 

While in college, Kremer spent a semester abroad at City University in Hong Kong, and after graduation, he went to work for an international furniture company with production in China, spending time between the two countries. Kremer said he returned to plastics in 2007, working as an engineer sourcing plastic extrusion machinery from China.

 

“Being third generation and having experience operating, maintaining and building the [extruders],” Kremer said, “I have a unique perspective on how to create the machinery to meet the customers’ needs. I focus on keeping the machinery simple and reliable, while making the extruders generic enough that parts can be locally sourced to prevent production delays.”

 

Kremer’s partner, Wood, graduated from Beijing University of Chemical Technology with a focus on plastic extrusion machinery and began working as a mechanical engineer in the industry in 2001.

 

Uway has manufacturing factories in Jiading and Nanjing, with about 55 workers in Jiading and 35 employed in Nanjing. The company also has two operations in the U.S., including an office and warehouse in Marshall, Ind., as well as sales and warehousing in Solon, Ohio, run by its U.S. distributor, Plastics Machinery Group.

 

“We are currently investigating U.S. manufacturing and hope to have an operating facility by mid-2015,” Kremer noted. Globally, Uway has sales offices in Belgium, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and India. It maintains technical service teams in the U.S., India and China.

 

Kremer said Uway builds extruders ranging in size from 16 to 300 mm, noting that at the top of its output, the company delivered two of what he called “multi-resin systems” in 2014, which had outputs of 8000 lb/hr in thermoplastics.

 

In terms of machine technologies, Kremer said Uway imports all the main components from the U.S., Germany and Italy, with China handling the machine frames and controls, using Schneider, Siemens and WEG electronics.

 

Uway staked out a large booth space at SPE’s Thermoforming Conference this September in Schaumburg, Ill., and it will participate in NPE2015 next March with a a 30-by-50-ft exhibit in the South Hall.

 

“I was born into a plastics family,” Kremer said. “My father and I have followed [my grandfather] through our own careers, and it has led me to branch out into the equipment side to help meet the demand for less expensive and less complicated machinery options.”