Mucell Extrusion technology hits US$100 million in annual sales

For the first time in its history, plastics technology provider MuCell Extrusion LLC has reached sales of US$100 million over a 12 month period.

Woburn, Mass.-based MuCell Extrusion licenses technology and sells related equipment for the production of microcellular foam products. The company specializes in extrusion and extrusion blow molding for bottles, sheet and film for consumer packaging.

“We have been closely tracking our progress toward the goal of $100 million annual sales by our customers for several years now,” said Mark Lindenfelzer, Mucell’s president. “A surge in sales of blow molded automotive ductwork by our customer Kyoraku in Japan, combined with growth in the packaging industry, really pushed us over the top as we wrapped up the first half of 2014.” 

The sales figure represents a 10-fold increase in five years, Lindenfelzer continued. “MuCell Extrusion first achieved the milestone of $10 million in annual sales of products made using its technology in 2009,” he said. “In the packaging industry, agreements with Dow Chemical and Styron for exclusive rights to certain blown film and flat sheet extrusion foaming patents have speared headed our growth. Most recently, Unilever has announced the successful launch of blow molded Dove Body Wash bottles using MuCell Technology.”

Currently 80 per cent of sales of products using MuCell Extrusion technology come from customers outside the packaging market in a range of applications, including seals and gaskets, automotive ductwork, pipes, wire coating, profiles and tubing, as well as some applications outside of the plastics industry. “As our business expands into the packaging market we are seeing a paradigm shift in two ways: applications are more readily translated and more scalable from one market to the next, and our customers are more open about the use of our technology as part of their overall corporate sustainability strategies,” Lindenfelzer said.