Costa Mesa’s Cimco Planning Singapore Plant

Cimco Inc. said Thursday that its Compounding Technology Inc. subsidiary will open its first overseas thermoplastic compounding plant in Singapore next year to tap into the growing Southeast Asian market.

The 24,000-square-foot plant is scheduled to open in June in the Jurong Town District, west of downtown Singapore. It will make precision thermoplastic injection molding used by computer, medical, commercial and industrial companies.

Compounding Technology, based in Corona, will make an initial capital investment of about $2 million. This will include compounding and plastic material handling equipment, a quality control laboratory and a research and development area.

The facility will initially have 12 employees, 10 from Singapore and two from the Compounding Technology’s U.S. operations. It will be headed by a Singaporean national, said Cimco spokeswoman Linda Smith,

Russell Gilbert, Cimco’s president and chairman, said the expansion into Singapore was at the request of a major U.S. customer with extensive operations in Southeast Asia. He said the Singapore government is providing tax incentives. The expansion will provide the company its first chance to broaden business in the region.

“The fact that our customer so strongly supported our decision to open a plant in Singapore made the decision very easy, once we were convinced the opportunity made fundamental financial sense,” he said.

“This is a milestone in the history” of Compounding Technology, Gilbert added. “Just a few years ago, its position in the thermoplastic compounding market was strictly regional.” In 1988, it opened a similar thermoplastics compounding plant in Charlotte, N.C.

Smith said the company will retain its sales representatives, Lindeteves-Jacoberg, to serve Pacific Rim customers for the Compounding Technology.

Currently, the Southeast Asia market is still a small part of the company’s business but it sees the region as a growing market for its thermoplastic moldings, said Cecilia A. Wilkinson, a Cimco spokeswoman in Los Angeles.

“The company sees opportunities to improve its service to current customers in Southeast Asia and to broaden its business among potential customers,” she said.