Covestro launches total solutions approach to turbocharge performance and innovation in the decorative industry

Covestro has announced the launch of a total solutions approach developed by the resins and functional materials business recently acquired from DSM. Based on unique customer and end-user insights, the approach supports paint manufacturers in accelerating innovation and product improvements within the high-performance decorative industry. By leveraging proprietary artificial intelligence tools and a broad set of technologies, Covestro will support paint manufacturers to develop differentiating solutions and address evolving market demands better than ever before.

Around the world, paint manufacturers are facing a rapidly changing decorative industry with winner-takes-all dynamics. In particular, demand is accelerating for sustainable solutions that protect health and safety, drive functionality and efficiency, and provide new emotional and sensory experiences – such as 1K and low-VOC systems, highly adhesive coatings, and ultra-matte paints. At the same time, regulatory authorities are requiring greater value-chain transparency and higher performance standards. To maintain a competitive position in the market, paint manufacturers are under increasing pressure to deliver differentiating products that address these global macrotrends and local market requirements.

To support its customers in creating futureproof portfolios and to turbocharge performance in the decorative industry, Covestro has developed a unique total solutions approach – known as its House of Resins. This approach makes use of proprietary market insights gained through artificial intelligence tools with big data, frontrunner bio-based resins, and a comprehensive understanding of all major advanced resin technologies. By working in close collaboration with paint manufacturers, Covestro will provide support to identify specific market demands more quickly and accurately and to develop solutions that meet the needs of all value chain parties.

Specifically, Covestro has so far monitored 7.8bn paint search queries on Google, analysed feedback from more than 550,000 paint reviews, and conducted in excess of 27,000 annual consumer interviews and more than 10,000 annual interviews with painters, architects and contractors. Based on these insights, Covestro draws on one of the broadest advanced technology toolboxes in the market – including alkyds, acrylics, urethanes, hybrids, and plant-based resins – to develop solutions to address market needs. ‘Insights 2 Innovations’ workshops facilitate this process.

As well as addressing functional performance requirements, solutions from Covestro also support its customers’ sustainability journeys. Among the organisation’s environmentally driven innovations is the Decovery® resin family: a frontrunner in bio-based resin technology containing up to 52% plant-based content. Sustainability dialogues between RFM and its partners further complement these efforts.

Gerjan van Laar, Marketing Segment Manager Decorative at Covestro said: "Our unique data-driven approach enables paint manufacturers to step up and seize emerging commercial opportunities like never before. From insights to innovation, we provide our customers with a total support package based on our in-depth knowledge of their needs and the needs of end customers, as well as the market as a whole. At Covestro, we can leverage the industry’s broadest set of decorative resin technologies to open new horizons for paint manufacturers. Together, we can accelerate the development of more sustainable, functional and healthy decorative paint solutions – and make the world a brighter place!”