From 12 to 16 October 2026, Safic-Alcan will once again take part in Fakuma, the international trade fair for plastics processing, held at Messe Friedrichshafen, Germany. Visitors can meet the Safic-Alcan Plastics team at Stand B5-5405, in Hall B5, where the company will present its portfolio of specialty solutions covering the full plastics value chain — from polymer production and compounding to processing and recycling.
This year, Safic-Alcan is proud to host Nouryon as a co-exhibitor at its stand. The two companies share a long-standing distribution partnership, recently extended to cover polymer recycling, and will jointly showcase solutions addressing one of the industry's biggest priorities this year: sustainability in plastics.
Ahead of the event, we spoke with Kamil Antos, Business Development Director Plastics & Polyurethanes at Safic-Alcan, and Martijn Ploegmakers, Marketing and Business Development Manager Recycling & Polymer Modification from Nouryon, to get their insights on the partnership, the recycling challenge, and what visitors can expect at Stand B5-5405.
Martijn Ploegmakers, Nouryon: Post-consumer recyclate is typically an inconsistent mixture of plastics with a wide variety of properties. Even when the polymer type is well sorted — PP, for example — a wide range of different polymer properties are still present within the mix. This causes inconsistent properties in products made from the recyclate and can lead to instability during further processing. Another effect is that this blend of different polymers typically has a restricted MFI range, so if a customer needs a particularly low or high MFI, finding a post-consumer recyclate that matches those criteria is difficult. A further factor is that recycled plastics have already had an entire life before becoming recyclate. Over that lifetime, the polymer has been exposed to sunlight and multiple processing steps, each causing degradation that results in inferior mechanical properties compared to virgin plastic. Nouryon addresses these challenges directly. Our organic peroxides can be added during the compounding step of the recycling process to modify the polymer's molecular architecture, resulting in improved mechanical properties and more consistent processing of the recycled polymer.
Kamil Antos, Safic-Alcan: I think the biggest challenge today is competitiveness. Many of our customers are asking themselves a very simple question: how can we continue manufacturing competitively in Europe with high energy and production costs, increasing regulation and growing sustainability requirements?
Sustainability and recycling are of course important, but the solutions also need to make economic sense. If they make production significantly more expensive, it becomes very difficult for European manufacturers to remain competitive.
Martijn Ploegmakers, Nouryon: We are actively developing a broader portfolio of solutions to support plastics recycling that extends well beyond the Perkadox® brand. Our primary focus today is on mechanical recycling.
Kamil Antos, Safic-Alcan: I see the biggest opportunity in upgrading recycled materials. There is plenty of recyclate available, but its quality is often inconsistent. With the right additives and technologies, we can turn this material into a reliable raw material for many useful applications.
Nouryon's peroxide technology is a good example. And the advantage of Safic-Alcan is that we work with many technology partners, giving us a very broad toolbox to find the right solution for each customer.
Martijn Ploegmakers, Nouryon: We will highlight our new product Perkadox® PM-60ST-GR, which goes a step further than the available solutions — giving recyclers the option to lower MFI as well, while also improving mechanical properties. What makes this unique is that it opens up new, higher-value applications for recycled materials, such as thermoforming, foaming, and blow molding — markets that were previously difficult to reach with recycled PP. Our technical experts will be present at the booth to discuss customer specific opportunities and challenges.
Kamil Antos, Safic-Alcan: I think our biggest strength is our people and the knowledge we have across the group. Our salespeople have very different backgrounds and areas of expertise. Nobody can be an expert in everything, but the important thing is that we know whom to ask.
Together with our development team and our network of technology partners, we can usually find a solution even when the answer is not obvious at the beginning. For me, this combination of local customer knowledge and expertise across the group is what makes the difference.
Martijn Ploegmakers, Nouryon: Organic peroxides are used to fine-tune the properties of recycled plastics, reducing batch-to-batch variation and improving efficiency in downstream processing. They can also be used to enhance mechanical properties, allowing customers to increase their recycled content without sacrificing performance.
Kamil Antos, Safic-Alcan: For me, Fakuma is mainly about people. We communicate digitally every day, but nothing replaces meeting face to face. Fakuma brings together customers, suppliers and colleagues with different experiences and ideas, and very often these personal discussions create new opportunities and new projects. At the end of the day, business is still about people.
Martijn Ploegmakers, Nouryon: Safic-Alcan is a long-standing and trusted partner for Nouryon, and extending our collaboration into recycling solutions is a natural next step. By combining our Perkadox® and Trigonox® organic peroxides with Safic-Alcan's strong technical and commercial reach, we can give customers across Europe easier access to the solutions they need to upgrade recycled plastics and meet their circularity targets. This expanded agreement lets us grow together with Safic-Alcan and our customers in this fast-developing market.
Kamil Antos, Safic-Alcan: I believe the key is mutual trust. We have known each other for many years, we listen to each other and we listen to our customers.
When a customer has a problem, we try to solve it together. Nouryon brings the technology and deep technical expertise, while we bring our knowledge of the customers and local markets. This combination allows us to work together on practical solutions that really help the customer.