Composites Association of New Zealand invites composites industry to 2022 conference

This year’s Composites Association of New Zealand (CANZ) conference, taking place Oct. 17 and Oct. 18, embraces rebuilding and rejuvenating in the changing business environment. Hosted by the University of Auckland and with representation from member-based organization, Composites Australia, CANZ aims to transform the New Zealand composite ecosystem into something more sustainable and eco-friendly by improving the way in which these materials are manufacturer. There will also be an interactive workshop focusing on moving to sustainable practices along with the introduction of new research concepts developed at the university.

“This year’s conference will be the first in-person event hosted after our Christchurch Conference in 2020 and we expect to provide a platform for our members to interact, get to know the developments happening around the industry and build better business relations,” Glenn Campbell, CANZ president, says. “Thus, the executives [have] decided to run the conference attendance free of charge to all members to increase participation and involvement.” As cost will still be involved to organize the event, Campbell requests all interested members to sponsor part of the event instead.

The conference will provide several technical presentations, along with exhibition stalls from CANZ’s sponsoring suppliers. Presentations will include Markforged’s (Watertown, Mass., U.S.) Konica Minolta demonstrating the company’s 3D printing technology; a workshop led by sustainability lead Catherine Taiapa on how to be better equipped to face sustainable challenges and adopt the business model of the future; Dr. Tom Allan from Auckland University’s Centre for Advanced Composite Materials (CACM) on how to manufacture fiber-reinforced thermoplastics using traditional thermoset composites manufacturing techniques; and more.

The University of Auckland has been partnering with the association from the beginning and we always cherished the Technical and Research expertise offered to us by the team. Last year Master’s student Tim McCafferty have done research on the reuse of mechanically recycled fibreglass products and he will be presenting his industry-focused research solution which could be adopted by every manufacturer. This is an incredible achievement by the Sustainable working group which has been working hard for the last few years to make recycling possible in Aotearoa. There were many pioneering works that happened in Composites sustainability, and we need more collaboration in the recycling sector to achieve our zero-waste goal. To facilitate this our sustainability lead Catherine Taiapa will be leading a Workshop on how to better equip our members to face sustainable challenges and adopt the business model of the future.

“This year’s conference will re-energize the Aotearoa [New Zealand] composites industry and bring back the charisma to chase those ambitions,” Vineeth Babu, CANZ vice president, says. “On behalf of the executive committee, I am wholeheartedly welcoming you all to join us at the conference to make the event a success. Request to register will be available to all members in the next few days and we encourage you to include participation from the engineering and manufacturing leadership team so that the ideas shared during the conference can be incorporated into your manufacturing processes.”

For more information about the event, visit this link.