With effect from 30 June 2008, machinery manufacturer Haitian International Holdings (Hong Kong / China; www.haitian.com) and its European subsidiary Haitian Europe (Cazzago San Martino / Italy) will split from their independent Italian sales partner HT Italy (Cazzago / Italy; www.htitalyspa.com). Haitian Europe will in future look after sales and service itself. According to reports in the Italian media, Haitian officially ascribes the move to a new strategy introduced by the parent company for the whole of Europe, but it seems more likely that it is connected with HT Italy's purchase of the insolvent plastics machinery manufacturer MIR (Brescia).

HT Italy had officially taken over the MIR plant in Brescia in mid-March 2008 – see Plasteurope.com of 31.07.2007 – together with its brand rights and customers after MIR had declared insolvency towards the end of 2005. HT's Managing Director Pietro Nicolazzi plans to shift the headquarters and production from Cazzago to the 28,000 m² MIR site and to market machinery for the processing of thermoplastics, thermosets and rubber under both the MIR and the Wave brand. For this purpose, the sister company Wave IMM was founded. At present, the portfolio comprises four horizontal models with clamping forces of 2,000 to 4,500 kN. Nicolazzi intends to purchase key components like the clamping units from China, but not from Haitian. At the same time, he announced that HT Italy would be renamed HT IMM in June 2008.

HT Italy/MIR – like its competitor Negri Bossi (Cologno Monzese, Milan / Italy; www.negribossi.com) – recently received an order from Fiat (see Plasteurope.com of 14.05.2008) worth around EUR 5m. Apparently, a total of 26 machines – the two-largest with a clamping force of 20,000 kN – will go to the OEM and to suppliers such as Ergom Materie Plastiche (Borgaro / Italy) and Automotive Lighting, which belongs to Magneti Marelli.