Life on Mars: Haitian International sets new sales records for 2014

Haitian International, one of the world's largest manufacturers of plastic injection moulding machines, has announced new records for the fiscal year 2014, with growth in both machine and export sales.

The company says strong performance of its ‘Generation 2’ machines, coupled with increasing share in the international markets, mean it has continued to maintain growth momentum, despite what it describes as a “challenging” year for the industry.

Overall, the Haitian Group delivered around 27,000 machines in 2014, with a turnover of 7.56 billion RMB (approx. EUR 1.12 billion). This, it says, is a five percent increase compared to the previous year, with net profit after taxes increasing by 8.2 percent.

Export sales grew by 13.1 percent and reached a new record of 2.331 billion RMB (approx. EUR 353 million).

Haitian says key drivers of growth were attributable to gaining market share in high-level plastics machinery markets such as the US, Korea and Thailand, where “double-digit” growths were recorded.

“Our committed efforts in enhancing communication and interaction with customers, product innovation that well addressed the market needs and enhanced operational and manufacturing efficiency enabled us to maintain our leadership in the plastics injection moulding machinery industry,” commented Mr. Zhang Jianming, Executive Director and CEO of Haitian International.

The Haitian brand's best seller was the ‘Mars Series’. Like last year, nearly 23,000 machines with ‘Mars Technology’ were sold, which represents cumulative global sales of 120,000 units.

The Group says other Generation 2 machines are increasingly contributing to its overall success. Its Jupiter II Series posted “enormous” growth rates – an increase of 33.5 percent compared to 2013 – and therefore maintained a mild growth in the medium-to-large tonnage segment.

In the small tonnage sector, the company says growth was primarily driven by its efforts to developing full-electric machines, especially through Zhafirs’ top-selling Venus II Series. With an increase of 6.8 percent compared to 2013, again more than 1,000 Venus machines were sold, representing a 22 percent increase in turnover.

Mr. Zhang concluded: “The outstanding price-to-performance ratio and ongoing improvement of self-developed core technologies in line with quality after sales service and efficient production scale of Haitian International, are the basis for further steady performance in 2015. Even in the face of slowing down of Chinese economy to a new ‘normal’ era.”