Fatih ARICAN
General Manager
Yapıchem
The first 7-8 months of 2016 were great in all respects. However, the unfortunate incidents that happened in our country in July very negatively affected the national economy and the construction sector in particular. Especially the increasing foreign exchange rate has significantly affected the additives sector, which imports its raw materials and sells its products on credit in Turkish Liras.
Despite all of these, Yapıchem concluded 2016 with a growth rate of 25 % percent and with more profit compared to previous years.
In 2016, Yapıchem continued to develop new products and provide its factory with necessary additional equipment and goods. Our own production of polycarboxylate products, which are the sector’s irreplaceable main raw materials in particular, have been taken to higher levels thanks to our hard work. The new generation additives developed thanks to this technology pave the way for products that can more easily get through some issues creating problems in concrete. Some of those products will be launched in March 2017. We also carry out significant R&D works regarding cement additives. We develop additives that are one step ahead of traditional additives. These new products reduce the concrete additive requirement when added to the concrete.
However, we postponed our plans to establish a new plant to 2017 for the said reasons.
Unfortunately 2017 started as a very negative year in terms of economy. The fact that the Turkish Liras saw a decrease in value during the first 10 days of the year left us reluctant to carry out a project or make an investment as we are operating in a sector whose entire costs are dependent on foreign exchange. We suspended our new domestic and international product investments until March 2017.