Recently, Research and Markets has just realesed a new report named “The Global Automotive Plastics and Composites Market—Insights and Trends”. This is a market insight based on the premise that lightweigting through the use of plastics and composites in automotive vehicles will help meet global standards, improve fuel use, and, ultimately, cut costs. Volume and revenue forecasts span 2015 (base year) through 2022. 

From this report, we will see that: 

- Under-the-hood (UTH) will be the most dynamic application segment that offers immense metal replacement opportunities for plastic compounds. High performance and specialty polymers will increasingly find growth opportunities in this segment. 

- Partnership agreements involving compound manufacturers, component manufacturers, and automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) will become more prevalent for specific application segments. 

- Fragmentation in segments such as blends, acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), and polypropylene (PP) will take place, with smaller independent compounders gaining significant market share.    

- The composites industry is here to stay due to the diversity and multitude of more than applications, with aerospace as the leading adopter of innovations and automotive as the biggest user in terms of volume.   

- Replacing steel and aluminum panels (e.g., roof, door, hood, trunk lid) is the immediate choice for carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) applications in cars. Chassis and powertrain (cool side parts) are expected to follow as the next big applications.       

- Optimized and new manufacturing methods will assist in the growth of composites. Transition to advanced fabrication techniques as well as techniques which enable faster production of CFRP/GFRP (glass fiber reinforced plastic) parts will enable their mass market uptake.

And here are key market trends from 2015 to 2022: 

- Regulatory measures by default call for a reduction in transportation emissions. The use of multi-materials will help companies reduce costs by optimizing material selection and meeting regulatory requirements.   

- Increasing pressure on automotive OEMs to develop cleaner and leaner vehicles, including electric vehicles, will be a driving factor for adoption and development of multi-materials (including plastics and composites).   

- Lower CO2 emissions and improved fuel economy are jointly achieved through weight reduction. Increased stringency towards vehicle emissions by governments around the world have propelled companies towards looking for ways of improving fuel efficiency. While electric vehicles are still cost prohibitive, production of lighter cars will result in decrease of emissions/mile of gasoline. 

- The global oil consumption has been increasing steadily over the past years, including the share of the transport sector. Automobiles constitute around X% of the total oil consumption globally, which drives the urgency of the automobile manufacturers to explore multi-materials (including plastics and composites) in order to efficiently keep their production costs low while also reducing fuel consumption.       

-The mega joint trends of safety and security are driving the demand for more, yet smaller, automotive devices and sensors that are able to better monitor and react to security breaches of all types as well as improve driver control of blind spots, reversing, and so on. 

- In order to meet this demand for increasingly smaller devices, multi-materials (including plastics and composites) will be needed.