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At the MD&M Brazil show (booth #709) here, SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business is showcasing its broad and deep healthcare resin portfolio with new next-generation applications from two leading Brazilian dental equipment customers, Gnatus and Indusbello. To differentiate Gnatus’ new Syncrus G8 dental station and Indusbello’s new dental sterilization tray from their respective competitors, each customer chose SABIC’s high-tech materials for their combination of high performance, superior toughness and visual appeal vs. traditional metal. These successful OEM products illustrate how Brazilian customers can capitalize on SABIC’s local production, technical services and application development expertise to create high-end products, gain a first-to-market advantage and accelerate their business growth and success.
“SABIC works hand-in-hand with its South American healthcare customers to anticipate and address their changing needs and power their competitive advantages for the long term with proven end-to-end solutions,” said Ricardo Knecht, general manager, South America, Innovative Plastics. “We applaud Indusbello and Gnatus for the commercial success of these incredible new products and are especially proud to have played a co-development role with them. SABIC’s proximity to these valued customers and others in the region will enable us to continue to provide our world-class expertise and technology solutions to fit their specific needs and circumstances – now and in the future.”
Creating a Distinctive Dental Station
Gnatus faces strong competition and is always looking for new ways to innovate and differentiate its dental station in the market. Among its challenges were the limitations of conventional materials. Working with the SABIC team, Gnatus chose Lexan* EXL copolymer to replace semi-crystalline polypropylene (PP) for the instrument tray to improve dimensional stability and reduce warpage after molding. For the articulator, Gnatus achieved cost-effectiveness and excellent performance by replacing polyamide with Valox* polybutylene terephthalate (PBT) resin. Specifically, Valox resin provided outstanding chemical resistance to maintain appearance over time, as well as custom color for superior aesthetics. Finally, the company used Lexan polycarbonate (PC) resin for the dental lighting reflector. This material offered excellent ultraviolet (UV) resistance and mechanical performance.
“Our ongoing collaboration with SABIC has helped our company to keep our position as one of the most innovative players in the South American dental equipment sector,” said Carlos Henrique Banhos, innovation director, Gnatus. “But we’re not stopping there. The high quality and regulatory compliance of SABIC’s materials, along with the company’s extensive knowledge of the industry, are playing a key role in our success as an exporter to more than 130 countries and helping us to further expand our business globally. SABIC’s assistance has been instrumental in propelling us forward as a market leader, and we look forward to many more years of collaboration in the development of ever-improving dental product technologies.”
Taking Sterilization Trays to a New Level
Indusbello was looking for a solution that could provide differentiation in the marketplace for its sterilization trays for dental instruments. SABIC’s Ultem* resin surpassed not only stainless steel but also polyphenylsulfone (PPSU) and polysulfone (PSU). Compared to metal, Ultem resin delivered flexibility in design, transparency, superior aesthetics and enhanced productivity through injection molding. Ultem resin’s ability to be custom colored using LNP* Colorcomp* specialty compound further expanded design freedom. Ultem resin outperformed PPSU in its ability to withstand several types of sterilization processes, including autoclaving. The SABIC material also delivered better sterilization performance than PSU.
“SABIC’s broad portfolio of tailored material solutions and the company’s drive to support our commercial ambitions inspired us to move beyond traditional materials; and because of this we are seeing tremendous results,” said Julio Cesar Benis, president, Indusbello. “Our new dental sterilization trays with high-performance Ultem resin and color-customized grades of LNP Colorcomp compounds have been very well received by our customers and have enhanced our competitive position as a fast-growing dental and medical OEM. We anticipate many future new-product innovations using SABIC’s advanced materials technologies, which are increasingly facilitated by their robust local production, technical expertise and development resources.”
For additional information on SABIC’s healthcare product portfolio, please go to www.sabic-ip.com. For technical product inquiries, please contact us at www.sabic-ip.com/prtechinquiry.
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