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Automotive Day

The automotive sector is key for LANXESS, as the company supplies products and applications for almost the entire segment’s supply chain. Its products are present in components ranging from tires to taillights and leather seats, as well as brake pads, airbags, and many others. This is one of the main reasons that led the company to organize the "Automotive Day Brazil", that was held on October 6, at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, Sao Paulo.

The first "Automotive Day Brazil" was extremely well received by clients in the Latin American automobile industry as well as by media representatives.

It was the biggest LANXESS event in Brazil in 2011: the first "Automotive Day Brazil". More than 350 representatives of the Latin-American automobile industry took up the invitation from LANXESS to inform themselves about product innovations in the automobile sector. In contrast to the "Rubber Day" series that has been running successfully since 2009, the LANXESS high tech synthetics, and pigments for automobile paint for automobile and truck manufacture were also introduced in addition to the high performance types of rubber.

The event was kicked off by the press conference on 5 th October 2011 in the Hyatt Hotel in Sao Paulo, to which LANXESS had issued invitations. Over 50 journalists from all major business and finance magazines and newspapers in Brazil, as well as the trade press, attended to inform themselves about our investments in Brazil as a company location as well as the "Automotive Day" – the reporting on the following day was correspondingly comprehensive. In the evening a dinner was held in the Hyatt for around 100 invited LANXESS clients in addition to further representatives from the political and business world. In his speech Axel C. Heitmann welcomed the guests and emphasized the story of LANXESS‘ success in the Latin American country: "In Brazil LANXESS has experienced a steady and consistent growth since it was established here. In this, of course, the acquisition of Petroflex has played a central role, as also has the organic growth from within!“

The next morning the "Automotive Day" got underway with an exhibition space in which were displayed the LANXESS products for automobiles and trucks, then Axel C. Heitmann together with his fellow board members, Werner Breuers and Rainer van Roessel opened the exhibition. "We definitely came to the right place at the right time. Brazil‘s automobile market started here in Sao Paulo 55 years ago and Brazil is now one of the strongest automobile markets in the world," says Heitmann.

In his speech guest speaker Dr. Christopher Borroni-Bird from the General Motors Company in Detroit presented his vision of mobility for tomorrow and emphasized how important it is that sustainable mobility concepts are developed, which differ greatly from today’s automobiles. In the future, electric mobility will play a significant role and cars will have to be able to communicate with each other in order to optimize traffic flow amongst other things. "A new DANN for cars has to be invented," according to Borroni-Bird. In the following panel discussion with Christopher Borroni-Bird, Werner Breuers, Rainier van Roessel, Luiz Alberto Vega (Volkswagen), Clayton Campanhola (ABDI) und Rogelio Goldfarb (ANFAVEA) innovative materials were discussion, which can support mobility in the future. In summary it is possible to say that business potential and opportunities are to be found for LANXESS in everything that moves.

In the afternoon further lectures and panel discussions on specific themes took place in three separate rooms: in hall one the participants concentrated on innovative high tech synthetics for the automobile industry, in hall two key technologies for fuel-saving tyres were the central topics and in hall three they dealt with sustainable and innovative rubber applications for vehicles. In the exchange between LANXESS experts with representatives of the largest car and tyre manufacturers in Latin America, solutions from LANXESS for customers‘ requirements were presented. In return the developers, chemists and engineers from LANXESS received a good insight into the needs of the customers so that, in future, they will be able to provide more precisely tailored products.