Toyo taps Asia’s booming office equipment market

Toyo Tire & Rubber has established a new company in Thailand to manufacture and distribute a distinctly non-tyre product. The new business, Toyo Rubber Chemical Products (Thailand) Limited, has been established in order to manufacture and distribute cleaning blades, which are components used in office equipment such as photocopiers, printers and fax machines. The new company is to be part of Toyo’s Urethane Business Unit.

A cleaning blade is an elastic blade made of urethane rubber that cleans and removes toners adhering to the photoreceptor (such as belt-drum, transfer belt-drum) of printers and other devices. Upon announcing the new company’s establishment, Toyo noted that the office equipment market is expanding rapidly in Southeast Asia at present and Thailand in particular has become a major global production base, second only to China.