European and American TPE suppliers are following markets to China.

China's low labor costs and the potential for serving a large Chinese domestic and export market have attracted western manufacturers from a broad range of markets that use TPEs, according to a multiclient analysis recently completed by Robert Eller Associates. Non-Chinese TPE compounders have begun to establish operations either on the Chinese mainland or nearby to accommodate these rapid growth markets. In doing so, they are said to encounter a new competitive interface with the local Chinese TPE compounder community which is well connected with domestic customers and capable of competing effectively.

The result is said to be a series of nationality-based, parallel TPE supply chains that, for the moment, rarely converge. As TPE technology proliferates to the domestic Chinese compounders, and the transplant compounders broaden their grade slate to accommodate local tastes, quality, pricing and performance levels, the supply chains will converge to form an intensely competitive arena for TPE compounds.

This study analyzes the intermaterials competition between olefinic TPVs, styrenic block copolymet TPEs, TPUs, COPE and TPOs through 2010. The China study includes analysis of the TPE industry structure.