(5) China

There are many local die manufacturers working and investing actively; however, there will be only inside demands to support them for a while. They have some issues of internet transfer caused by blackout and an insufficiency of maintenance. Some people say they have difficulties in sending data by internet in the suburbs.
Asian, Pacific and Japanese die and mould industries will always be one of the major die and mould supplier in the world. We need to keep our eyes especially on relationship between China and Japan.

(4) INDIA

In 1985 when the writer visited India for his first time, people seemed like to have few knowledge and understandings of die industry working in gloomy plants in small towns: nevertheless the recent rapid progress in IT industry brought prosperity in their economy.
Japanese and British started to invest little by little in Indian industry even though it is not as big as Chinese one. Being one of the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India and China – rapidly growing countries), India may be the next developing country following China.
They are now spending time and cost to improve production facility and procurement of patterns, castings and components and to train technicians. There is no concern about internet data transfer.

(3) THAILAND

Thailand, called “Detroit of pick-up truck”, is trying to improve die industry vigorously following Japanese companies in Thailand. It is now becoming one of the important industries with their convenience transportation to China and Malaysia.
Despite large investments on facilities, they are always lack of production ability that is short in supply compared to demand. This causes full-capacity only with domestic orders. And furthermore, they are not used to European and American standards and quality warranty due to lack of experiences.
Most die manufacturers offer full-service productions. However, they still have some issues to be improved in internet data transfer.

(1) KOREA

Korean die industry nowadays has power that reminds us of Japanese die industry of 20 years ago, the rapid development. Japanese die manufacturers, for couple of years, tend to depend on Korean die manufacturers in many aspects; Korean die industry has been involved very much in Japanese as a one market. Full-service suppliers have a good quality in their products. They export aggressively their products from Korea to Japan/Europe/North America.
There are many companies in Korea specializing in each category of stamping die business, e.g. management, design, pattern, casting, machining, and finishing. Demand on these specialty companies will increase more and more in the future.
There is no concern about Internet data transfer.
A couple of things we have to follow Korean way of business are:
＊To accept more number of workers from foreign countries to keep the expenses.
＊To give better treatment to excellent designers to keep them stay in the　company.

Southeastern Asian Die and Mould Industries

Because of the rapid development in southeastern Asian die industries, Japanese die manufacturers, which have showed huge progress to suit automotive companies’ requirement, are now building production plants in southeastern Asia, seeking their convenience and better qualities. Lately, those constructions made local people to understand the importance of die industry, and to invest more in local die manufacturer.
Local customers in those southeastern Asian countries became to be satisfied slowly with local die manufacturers even though their facilities and work experiences are still not enough for their requirement.
One of the reason of increase in number of die manufacturers, it is believed, is the development and improvement of maker’s CAD/CAM, NC machines, Forming Simulations, Milling machine, die standard and pricing. Here are some current situations and circumstances of die and mould industries in southeastern Asia:

Die and Mould Industry with China

As China develops its automotive industry recently, a structure of world automotive industry is changing widely, including die and mould industry. Now China just can not be ignored but is becoming one of the biggest markets in the world.
Due to Chinese development, as one of the influences, it is now becoming difficult to find and hire skillful workers in Japan, Korea and Taiwan; they were all taken by Chinese makers to support their work.
There are many skillful workers, in Korea and Taiwan, who eager to work in Japan, as Japan have advanced techniques in automotive technology. However, those skillful workers tend to run their own business and make contracts with company who hires them with better price and for long-term. Thus, Taiwanese prefer to work in Chinese mainland for those reasons and also because of an advantage in their language.
A demand for skillful workers will definitely increase in Chinese automotive industry for its development in their new car business. This kind of phenomenon was expected by no one until Chinese started to show their huge progress.
There are concerns about direct influences on a supply and price of castings and steels due to their huge development.
It may look calm now while Chinese import completed dies, however, once they start to make die in mainland, it may bring us supply and demand imbalance in casting and steel market. There actually was a moment of lack of steels in Korea last year, and also it was big news that one of the major auto companies postponed their production due to lack of steels. The more the market is huge, the more the influences spread.

Overseas’ Die and Mould industries in the year 2005
Remarkable Chinese and southeast Asian Die and Mould Industries

The writer had worked for one of the largest Stamping Die manufacturer for 20 years, had left the company and started his own business dealing between car maker and stamping die maker as a specialty firm named “The Kataya.com Inc”. This company name, which may sound unfamiliar to many people, was decided by the president, showing his enthusiasm and strong will to be successful in a new coming die and mould industry. (Kataya means “Die Maker” or “Die Manufacturer”)
The Kataya.com Inc.’s main business is to act as an agent between North America/Europe and southeastern Asia by getting and giving inquiry for stamping die of automotive. They sometimes get order directly from customer and manage project. They offer, in addition, translation and interpretation service of technical terms, consulting service for local material supply and sub-contract by skilled bench workers.

(2) TAIWAN

Taiwan once had an economic crisis for this past 3 to 4 years due to a number of withdrawals of Automotive Industries out of its country. However nowadays they are recovering their power with the advance of Chinese.
With advantage in language, they are trying to go into mainland (China) along with Taiwan in near future.
It seems like, since Taiwan has lots of experience in European / North American standard, advanced technology and experience of Taiwanese die makers are necessary for Chinese ones.
There are many pattern makers and the quality is still not good as Korea yet, and they have issue to be improved in automation technology such as transfer dies. Also, data flow using internet needs to be improved.
There will be new times of automotive industry in Taiwan using their big pipe to China.