Custom Xpress color service

Made-to-order products and fast delivery used to be mutually exclusive. Now, with GE - Plastics' new Custom Xpress color service, customers can get the precise color of GE's Lexan* or Cycoloy* resin they require in six business days or less. The service allows customers to avoid the drawbacks of self-coloring, such as investment in costly production equipment, while providing the world-leading color-matching capabilities of GE - Plastics. The Web-based ordering system gives customers the flexibility to make changes up to eight hours prior to production. And GE's fully digital global color database ensures consistency worldwide and from batch to batch.

Guus Boekhoudt, Field Market Director, GE - Plastics Europe said, "The Custom Xpress small-lot color service was developed in response to demand from one of our customers, Nokia, to support its speed-to-market strategy. Working closely with Nokia to understand their materials requirements, GE - Plastics developed a completely new and innovative custom-color model. By allowing the customer to own the schedule and quickly produce small, consistent resin lots, the service provides true on-demand ordering."

The GE model provides a number of important benefits to resin customers. First, the small lots keep inventory levels low or non-existent and help prevent waste from obsolete materials. With the extremely fast turnaround, companies can react quickly to market needs without having to plan far in advance. Improved color consistency and pellet performance (no dust or streamers) enhances productivity. Finally, customers enjoy the flexibility of fast customization without having to invest in their own color capabilities.

To create the new service, GE - Plastics has drawn upon its world-class technical expertise and state-of-the-art facilities. Highly skilled in-house color specialists at the Customer Innovation Center in Bergen op Zoom, The Netherlands, can perform on-the-spot color matching and work with designers to customize colors, textures, and effects. The company's quality controls and single pigment dispersion technology ensure in-lot and lot-to-lot color consistency.

GE works with customers, and based on their needs, prepares them for Xpress ordering. At this stage, customers access the Web order entry system that connects them directly to the production line schedule. Resin lots ship daily from central production locations to the customer's site.

*Lexan and Cycoloy are trademarks of General Electric Company.