Plasma­treat Asia Pacific Pte Ltd

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Thomas Markert, Managing Director

Could you tell us more about your trade, what kind of products, services or solutions does Plasma­treat offer?

Founded in 1995, Plasma­treat is the world market leader in atmospheric plasma surface treatment & coating solutions and our plasma systems are successfully used by our global customer base in various industries like automotive, electronics, medical, packaging, renewable energy & aerospace.

Through our Openair-Plasma® treatment technology for industrial fine cleaning & surface activation as well as our PlasmaPlus® surface coating processes we are able to functionalize materials such as plastics & polymers, metal, glass, board or composites. This is especially important for applications where clean surfaces and a high surface energy are critical for subsequent processes.

Why was it important for Plasma­treat to set up a company in Sin­ga­pore and could you describe the footprint of your company in the ASEAN region?

Sin­ga­pore offers us the ideal location to serve our highly diverse customer base in the South East Asia region. With its many research insti­tutions and corporate R&D/regional HQ offices, its highly skilled workforce, an excellent connectivity through its Air & Sea port as well as the reliable & strong legal system, Sin­ga­pore ticked all our boxes when we were setting up our operations.

Our Sin­ga­pore office serves as the regional HQ with 3 main functions:

1. Regional HQ to lead & drive all regional sales, marketing & finance activities
2. Regional Application & R&D Centre with our own plasma laboratory to directly evaluate our customer’s applications and foster cooperation with leading research insti­tutions & corporate R&D offices
3. Regional After-Sales & Training Centre to support our customers in case they require technical assistance, spare parts, maintenance or training.

Furthermore, we are operating a widespread partner network throughout the different markets in South East Asia. In many situations we also deployed on-the-ground plasma engineers with a strong focus on hands-on assistance and customer success, aided by our regional HQ.

In the recent Covid-19 situation, how has Plasma­treat contributed to aid during the pandemic?

To aid the global fight against COVID-19, we adapted our existing atmospheric plasma technology and developed our Plasma sterilization cabinet to clean personal protective equipment to help alleviate mask shortages in countries. Since our Openair-Plasma® jet systems were previously successfully used to fight the Ebola virus, we are now qualifying its sterilization cabinets to kill the Covid-19 virus. This way, masks and other PPE equipment can be reused safely and it also helps to save considerable cost for the worldwide health care systems.

How do you predict the future of the ASEAN region and Sin­ga­pore?

ASEAN as a region, will continue to be a very relevant market in the future. Especially due to its young population and a strong growth in the middle class and therefore in the median household income, the regional demand is going to increase.

Also due to the steady and growing foreign direct investment and the rising gross exports from the region, ASEAN is poised to become one of the leading economic regions in the years to come, which offers tremendous growth opportunities, especially in the construction and infrastructural sector but also in manu­fac­tur­ing as well as in service markets.

Sin­ga­pore due to the reasons I mentioned earlier as well as its geographic location at the heart of the region and the almost non-existent tariffs within ASEAN will continue to play an important role in that process. Especially for SME companies like us that are looking for a similar regional set-up.

What do you think are the advantages of being in German Centre?

The German Centre offers the right mix between office set-up and commu­nity interaction. You can always exchange past experiences and advice with other tenants easily and this helps tremendously to avoid any missteps or saves a lot of time gathering information on your own.

Furthermore, GCS offers its tenants the opportunity to book additional space for meetings or regional conferences and its friendly staff also supports companies if the current situation requires them to scale up or down.

Through its high-quality events and talks that are organized regularly, it really goes above and beyond any services a normal “landlord” would offer. You always stay informed, get the chance to meet interesting people and mingle with like-minded executives at one of the B2B events.

What advice would you give to other companies who would like to set up their office in German Centre Sin­ga­pore?

The German Centre Sin­ga­pore offers a great package and a straight forward way to set-up a presence in Sin­ga­pore. Especially for newcomers it is highly beneficial to take advantage of the close-nit, almost family-like commu­nity and it will help them find their way around in Sin­ga­pore and get started.

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