Guest Column: Technology thought leadership in rubber industry is key

The ACS Rubber Division recently held its Spring Technical Meeting in Warrensville Heights, Ohio. It was great to see folks in person, which still feels like such a blessing after previous pandemic interruptions.

Except for a few international speakers giving their presentations remotely and a couple of last-minute cancellations, it closely resembled a pre-COVID-19 spring meeting. The venue had plenty of comfortable space for networking with colleagues and Starbucks coffee available to fuel the discussions.

I gave a presentation at this conference on strain amplitude jump experiments with the rubber process analyzer (RPA) to characterize filler networking behavior. Part of the research I discussed is from a project that I worked on with Clement Robin from Hutchinson Research and Innovation Center (Chalette-sur-Loing, France). When I attend these technical meetings in the rubber industry, I am reminded of their bigger impact to the companies involved, beyond the general sharing of scientific insights toward elevating the whole industry. It is my experience—having spent time on both sides of the supplier-customer business development table—that technology thought leadership is key to new product sales by promoting productive technical discussions and creating mutual respect in business-to-business interactions.

Building and testing of experimental tires, automotive parts, etc. is a very expensive part of the development process. A rubber product manufacturer is far more likely to conduct a product trial of a new raw material if it has confidence in the scientists and engineers who developed it. Technical meeting presentations help suppliers build this trust with their customers.

Staying active in giving conference presentations to demonstrate thought leadership to customers can be a tricky balance. Companies want to avoid helping their competitors catch up. Also, there are opportunity costs when smart technical people spend time working on these research investigations and take time away from their "real jobs" to attend the conferences and present their results. On the positive side, these are great professional development opportunities for the scientists that generally lead to more job satisfaction. Many R&D staff members have master's and doctorates, so it is natural and personally rewarding for them to give conference presentations and publish papers like they did during graduate school.

One of the things I enjoy in my consulting business is the chance to support a company in achieving its product development and technical marketing goals, including helping them demonstrate technical leadership to the industry through publications and conference presentations. So I plan to keep contributing to (and enjoying) rubber industry conferences for as long as I can.

I look forward to seeing you at the International Tire Exhibition & Conference, and the Rubber Division's International Elastomer Conference in the fall.

Robertson is an R&D consultant with Polymer Technology Services L.L.C., and is co-chair of the ITEC conference program. Reach him at [email protected].