CHINAPLAS 2026 – Impressions of a World Trade Fair in moving times (again)
What could happen after last year´s tariff announcement by the US administration coinciding with Chinaplas?! In 2026 we knew better BUT the world´s largest exhibition for plastics & rubber proved for W&H to be successful! High visitor numbers, many quality and hot discussions, a great Exxon Mobil Open House, lots of smiles and good moments with customers.
Before the show, on Monday, April 20th, W&H's Asia-Pacific team took the opportunity to discuss the developments of W&H global and Asia with Sascha Witt, CSO W&H, and Michael Fischer, CEO Asia-Pacific, at the sales meeting – which took place both F2F and also hybrid for participants who joined online. During intensive exchanges between the sales, service, GBs and technical sales they discussed innovations and market trends in Asia for extrusion, printing and converting. Besides new machine topics, HAP´s team agreed on action points for Performance IBC, Easy2Run and – given todays environment – ink cooling systems to safe solvents – with country specific customer approaches – which kicked-off during the Chinaplas!
During the show at the world´s largest exhibition complex (500,000m²) W&H was able to emphasize its market position with a 120m² booth - cost-optimized and still representative and in a well exposed headstand location at the German Pavilion.
Overall visitor numbers increased to 350,189, this year (75% of from China, 25% from abroad) and also W&H has seen a strong visitor flow. Despite flight limitations for international visitors, W&H has witnessed the majority of its visitors from abroad which highlights the international character of the show and W&H´s customer base.
Despite the challenging circumstances, Michael Fischer, CEO Asia-Pacific, remains optimistic. “Chinaplas marks the pulse of the industry and for W&H Asia has a strong comeback with investments, in particular in China!”
