According to forecasts by the Tami (Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry) plastic materials machinery committee, 70% of injection machines smaller than 1600 tons in operation in the country will, within a decade or so, be  electric-type ones, a trend that will also see local manufacturers obliged to convert their production lines. Tami also sustains that it was Taiwan’s own manufacturers that, around twenty years ago, were the first to introduce “all-electric” models, albeit subsequently abandoning them on the grounds of their high costs, which were due to the fact that the most important components had to be purchased from German or Japanese producers.

Thus, a new conversion to electric machines is now taking place (both for injection moulding and for blow moulding), even though various manufacturers are still using western suppliers because they offer more high-tech parts. Taiwan is the world’s fifth largest producer of machines for the plastics and rubber industries, recording, again according to Tami, a 2013 turnover of over 1.5 billion dollars; it has been suggested that the 2014 figures will show a five per cent increase in production.