Reinforced Plastic Market - Forecast(2023 - 2028)

Reinforced Plastic Market Overview

Reinforced plastic market size is estimated to reach US$250.1 billion by 2027 after growing at a CAGR of 5.5% during 2022-2027. Reinforced plastic has been developed to produce strong and corrosive material. Reinforcement, as the name suggests, is used to enhance the mechanical properties of plastics. The reinforced plastic products normally contain from 10 to 40wt% of plastic, although in some cases plastic content may go as high as 60% or more. The industry continues to go through a major evolution in reinforced plastic structural and semi-structural materials. It is used in various industries like food and beverages, electronics, sports, construction, automotive and many more. Reinforcements can be used to change or improve the properties of thermoplastics and matrix. The resins used are epoxy resin, polyester (thermosets and thermoplastics), polycarbonate and many more. Fiber-reinforced plastic is another kind of reinforced plastic which is a composite material made up of a polymer matrix reinforced with fibers.

COVID-19 Impact

COVID-19 has not only created a global health crisis but it is also threatening the environment. During pandemic, many industries are affected and thus, the production of reinforced plastic as well. One of them is aerospace industry. In commercial aviation, companies are experiencing disruption in production and slowing demand due to terminated travelling. Demand for spare parts is also down since less maintenance is needed. While on the defense side, there is less impact of COVID-19 because the manufacturing may be slow but the demand over the next two years is unlikely to be affected since budgets for these projects had been allocated prior to the pandemic. It is also used in automotive industries, where automotive industry was severely affected by the pandemic and has seen many downfalls in the last two years. According to International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers (OICA), the collected data showed a 16% decline in the 2020 production. Also, all main producing countries had sharp declines, ranging from 11% to almost 40%. Thus, the overall demand of reinforced plastic was declined and its production was also impacted.

Report Coverage 

The “Reinforced Plastic Market Report – Forecast (2022-2027)”, by IndustryARC covers an in-depth analysis of the following segments of reinforced plastic industry.

Key Takeaways

• Reinforced plastic can be molded and reshaped again due to its low toxicity therefore it is mainly used as a thermosetting plastic. It is also used in insulators, disc brake pistons motor components and many more.
• Now-a-days, fiber-reinforced plastic is used at a faster pace by replacing steel reinforcement for reinforced concrete structures including cast-in-place and pre- and post-tensioned bridges, columns, beams and other components.
• Due to some properties like light weight and high strength, reinforced plastics are widely used in automotive industries as body and structural components.

Figure: Asia Pacific Reinforced Plastics Market Revenue, 2021-2027 (US$ Billion)

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Reinforced Plastic Market Segment Analysis – By Plastic Type

Thermoplastics held the largest reinforced plastic market share in 2021, with a share of over 65%. Thermoplastics can be molded and remolded repeatedly without any change in its properties. The polymer structure associated with thermoplastics is that of individual molecules that are separate from one another and flows past one another. Thermoplastic resins become soft when heated and can be shaped or molded while in a heated semi-fluid state. Once the thermoplastic resin is molded to the proper state, it is cooled until hardened. Thermoplastics have faster processing than thermosets, which is another plastic type, because there is no curing necessary. Thermoplastics have low toxicity and can be remelted and recycled. Thermoplastics have high delamination, chemical, and damage resistance, and low moisture absorption. The damage resistance of thermoplastics is due to high impact strength and fracture resistance. Reinforced thermoplastics are concentrated to be used in more and more applications like underground pipes, camera, appliances, automotive industry, aircraft and other high-performance products. As a result, over 50wt% of all reinforced plastics types are principally injection molded. Thus, thermoplastic, which is a kind of reinforced plastic, is making its way in almost all the industries.

Reinforced Plastic Market Segment Analysis – By Application

Sports goods segment held the largest reinforced plastic market share in 2021, with a share of over 21%. Fiber-reinforced plastics are often used in sports goods to increase their lightweight degree. Carbon fiber-reinforced plastics are used to reduce the high performance of products’ weight. Fiber-reinforced plastics are also suited to integrate additional features and functions as well. It is used in composite materials as it has outstanding specific strength and specific stiffness like bicycles, badminton rackets, tennis rackets, ping pong rackets and many more. One of the main advantages of using fiber reinforced plastics is its internal coupling effects in an anisotropic layer design. The glass-reinforced plastic fiber is the best one economically and the carbon-reinforced plastic fiber is the best in terms of technical performance. According to India Brand Equity Foundation, in India, in financial year 2021, the total sports goods export accounted for US$ 268.52 million and for the month of March 2021, it was US$ 24.03 million. Therefore, reinforced plastics are majorly used in sports goods due to its light-weight and additional features.

Reinforced Plastic Market Segment Analysis – By Geography

The Asia Pacific is the leading region accounted for the largest share in the reinforced plastic market in 2021, with a share of over 36%. Owing to the Asian countries like China, India and Japan, the demand for carbon-reinforced plastic increased and used in in different sectors like aviation, construction, and automotive. Fiber-reinforcement plastics are used in almost all industries and has maintained its rapid growth. In China, thermosetting fiber-reinforcement plastic is one of the largest fields of polymer based composite materials. In India, earlier, the Indian fiber-reinforcement plastic industry was used in a limited industries like electrical. However, after globalization, there had seen a huge jump due to its major advantages offered by composites. Composites are 12 times stronger than steel, have non-corrosive quality and are light eight. Thus, currently it is used in numerous industries like manufacturing, aerospace and defense and automotive. According to India Brand Equity Foundation, the government of India expects automobile sector to attract US$ 8-10 billion in local and foreign investments by 2023. Thus, Asia-Pacific, is growing its production and expanding its manufacturing units for its development.

Reinforced Plastics Industry Market Drivers

Increased use in Aerospace and Defense

Reinforced plastic is used in advanced composite components for aerospace, defense, spacecraft and automotive products. It is also used in helicopters, military aircraft and other platforms. Carbon fibers in fiber-reinforced plastics can reduce the weight by 25% but ensure equal or greater strength when compared to aluminum sheets. It offers excellent strength and can tolerate harsh environments and extreme temperatures. As they expand a little with heat, it possesses high stiffness. Though it is expensive, but when it comes to aerospace industry, it saves money where every gram of additional weight is grudged because of the effect on the fuel consumption, journey length and costs. Carbon-FRP also allows for complex molded part production, reducing the number of parts by an astonishing 95%. This makes production simpler, faster and cheaper compared to other materials like steel or cast aluminum. Many giant modern aircraft are made of more than 50% carbon-FRP. Helicopter rotor blades on high-end drones are also increasingly being made using FRPs. According to U.S. Aerospace and Defense, In 2019, the aerospace & defence industry posted strong annual growth with combined industry sales revenue amounting to $909 billion. Thus, as the aerospace industry is growing, the demand and production of reinforced plastic is also growing.

Surge in Construction Industry

Fiber-reinforced plastics are widely used in the construction industry recently. It is used in bridges and roads, it can also be used fix the existing structures with slabs, columns or beams to enhance their capacity or repair damage. It is extremely cost-effective and useful for older structures which are faced with loads far greater than they are originally designed to bear as it is very light weight, stiff and mechanically strong. It is also used to manufacture highway structures like signboards, drainage systems as well as auto skyways, utility poles and pipelines for gas, water and sewage. It is also used for building prefabricated houses, business houses, swimming pools and many more. According to India Brand Equity Foundation, In Union Budget 2021, to support initiatives such as ‘Housing for All’ and ‘Smart Cities Mission’, the government allocated US$ 1.89 billion to AMRUT and Smart Cities Mission. Therefore, the growth in the construction industry is boosting the demand for reinforced plastic market.

Reinforced Plastic Market Challenges

Non-Degradable Nature of Reinforced Plastic

As plastics can be readily molded in any shape and in a variety of products, and are cheap, lightweight and durable, it is widely used in many applications and industries as well. A major portion of plastic produced each year is used to make disposal items of packaging produced each year which is used to make disposable items or one-time use products that are then discarded within a year of manufacturing. This tells that the use of plastic is not sustainable at all. And because of the durability of the polymers involved, heavy quantities of waste plastics are accumulated as scrap in landfills and in natural habitats of the world. According to National Library of Medicine, around 4% of world oil and gas production, a non-renewable resource, is used as feedstock for plastics and a further 3–4% is expended to provide energy for their manufacture. Thus, the main problem of reinforced plastic is its non-renewable products which are not sustainable for the environment.

Reinforcement Plastic Market Outlook

Reinforcement Plastic market top 10 companies include:

1. Solvay
2. SGL Carbon SE 
3. Teijin Limited 
4. Toray Industries, Inc.
5. Formosa Plastics Corporation
6. Mitsubishi Plastics, Inc.
7. DowAksa Advanced Composites Holdings B.V.
8. Hexcel Corporation
9. Nippon graphite industries co. ltd
10. Plasan Carbon Composites

Recent Developments

• In April 2022, DowAksa inaugurates the new plant for carbon fiber composite materials for its new integrated production plant in Yalova, Turkey. 
• In November 2021, Solvay is jointly working with 9T Labs to help bring additively manufactured carbon fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP) parts to mass production for the aerospace, medical, luxury/leisure, automation, and oil and gas industries using some deep expertise in the production of thermoplastic composite prepreg tape.
• In July 2019, SGL Carbon has reached a milestone in the history of serial production of fiber composite components by delivering its millionth composite leaf spring to Volvo Cars.

Relevant Reports

Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic Market - Forecast(2022 - 2027)

Report Code: CMR 0055

Glass Reinforced Plastic Market - Forecast(2022 - 2027)

Report Code: CMR 54206

Fiber Reinforced Plastic (FRP) Market - Forecast(2022 - 2027)

Report Code: CMR 1386

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