New composite materials rewrite the pattern of sofa foot industry

Driven by the dual carbon target, the innovation of Sofa Foot materials is showing an explosive trend in 2023. The proportion of traditional zinc alloy materials has decreased from 68% in 2020 to 54%, replaced by carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) and biobased composite materials.
The bamboo fiber composite footrest developed by a new material enterprise in Zhejiang has improved impact resistance by 40% and reduced weight by 35%. It has received an annual order of 2 million sets from IKEA. More noteworthy is that environmentally friendly casters made from recycled PET have passed the Blue Angel certification in Germany, reducing the carbon footprint of individual products by 62%.

The industrial collaborative innovation model is taking shape: Foshan Hardware Industry Cluster and the Institute of Materials Science and Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences jointly establish a joint laboratory to develop the world's first self-healing coating technology. This technology extends the wear life of sofa legs to 10 years and is expected to reduce 300000 tons of metal waste annually.
The capital market has responded enthusiastically to this: in the first half of the year, new material research and development enterprises accounted for 47% of the financing events in the furniture and hardware field, with an average valuation premium rate 2.3 times higher than that of traditional manufacturing enterprises. But there are still pain points in the industry - the production cost of biodegradable materials is still 1.8 times that of traditional materials, which restricts large-scale commercial use.