Recommendations for Rohit Singh, product manager for Zanlon Essay Example
Recommendations for Rohit Singh, product manager for Zanlon Essay Example

Recommendations for Rohit Singh, product manager for Zanlon Essay Example

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  • Pages: 3 (649 words)
  • Published: January 3, 2018
  • Type: Case Study
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Rohit Singh, who serves as the product manager for Zanlon within Polymer Industries' Bulk Plastics Division, was presented with a difficult decision as he drafted his marketing plan for the upcoming year. Singh had to determine whether to suggest slashing or raising prices, and whether to allot funds for substantially increasing sales volume or only experiencing a minor rise in volume while charging higher prices. He had confidence that the cost of Zanlon would gradually decline in accordance with the typical plastic product life cycle.

Singh's main concern was about the timing and magnitude of a potential price change, if any, due to the expected significant increase in unit volume as Zanlon, an engineering plastic with properties applicable to various industries traditionally served by steel, zinc, and aluminium, as well as nylon and ABS, gained wider usage. The auto

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motive, appliance, plumbing and hardware, and communications fields offered potential applications for Zanlon.

Zanlon resin was a versatile material that could be cast with precision, extruded, and machined like metal while weighing considerably less than zinc, brass, or steel. It boasted high resistance to both heat and impact and could be produced in a range of colors. Zanlon was a direct competitor to Nuclan, manufactured by the Pyramid Chemical Corporation, as both were types of nucleopolymides (NPAs) and sold for the same price of Rs.

The market price is 75/- per kg, with Pyramid holding approximately 66% of the overall market share and Polymer Industries holding the remaining third. The market is experiencing an annual growth rate of 33%. Nuclan and Zanlon have three notable differences. Firstly, Zanlon is marginally less flexible than Nuclan, which ca

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be advantageous in certain scenarios but disadvantageous in others.

In addition to being faster, Zanlon allows molders to reduce molding time by 5-40%. Furthermore, Zanlon in colored forms is Rs.4/- per kg cheaper than Nuclan in colored forms. Polymer Industries provides color capsules that can be mixed with Zanlon (a translucent gray) to create more than 500 different shades at a cost of Rs.

At Pyramid, a color system was developed for Nuclan at an additional cost of 3/- per kg over the base price of Rs.75/-. This feature was unavailable to Nuclan users and deemed unachievable. As a result, Nuclan in colors had to be created at the Pyramid plant and sold with a premium of Rs.7/- per kg.

Approximately 40% of all NPAs sold were dedicated to color applications. In terms of cost savings, both Zanlon and Nuclan offered significant advantages over metals like zinc and brass. These NPAs not only cost less, but also come with additional machining cost savings for industrial users. Comparatively, nylon was slightly less expensive than Zanlon but lacked the same level of heat resistance. On the other hand, ABS was only half as costly but significantly less heat and chemical resistant with lower strength than the NPAs. Despite having a much larger market presence, ABS was mainly limited to decorative applications such as trim for major appliances.

The cost of producing Zanlon was Rs.20.8, with Rs.8.3 being the variable cost and Rs.12 being the fixed cost.

After deducting marketing, technical development, and administrative costs of Rs.22.1 from the revenue, a pre-tax profit of Rs.5 was achieved.

Singh had the advantage of having a variety of pricing options,

ranging from 32.1 per kg. These options could allow him to achieve different goals, such as (1) capturing more of the market share from Pyramid through price reductions, (2) maintaining the sales of Zanlon for specific applications that nylon was appropriate for and was less expensive than other materials, or (3) competing with ABS in the large decorative plastics market due to its current scarcity.

Although the price of Zanlon may increase, there are still significant opportunities for it to replace zinc and brass in the automotive, appliance, and plumbing fixture industries. Therefore, it could be viewed as an appealing alternative for these applications.

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