As ongoing economic uncertainty remains our reality, it’s no secret that sectors like manufacturing and chemicals – amidst a growing list of others – remain under pressure. In business environments like today, it’s important that leaders and businesses are strategic, agile enough to adapt, forward thinking and moving, and optimistic. As a former competitive athlete, I could say we must do whatever it takes to keep moving the ball downfield.   

We talk regularly as a team about the importance of controlling what we can. During a recent employee town hall, we highlighted inspiring examples of how we are keeping our six core values in focus and advancing in impactful ways related to environmental health and safety, our employees, continuous improvement, corporate social responsibility and customer excellence. Despite market challenges, we have improved our safety performance, begun implementing employee involvement committees at sites worldwide to promote our culture, forged ahead with our integration activities, finalized our near-term growth strategy, and continued investing in innovative technologies and projects.

I am often asked what I’m most excited about related to our company’s future. Without hesitation, two words come to mind; words we’ve used often since our legacy organizations became Vibrantz: Better together. As one company, Vibrantz now has core competencies in particle engineering, material science and color technology, and we’ve used our expertise platform powerfully over the last year plus to positively impact customers all over the world.  

This month, the blog features inspiring examples across our three business units of how coming together has amplified our ability to embrace our core commitment to customer excellence.

Perhaps one of the more obvious ways Vibrantz is now able to benefit customers is through our expanded advanced materials, color solutions and performance coatings offerings. Our July 2023 blog featuring Vibrantz’s play in automotive is a perfect example. Automotive equipment manufacturers who may have previously only used our automotive polishing for exteriors, now have access to our advanced technologies for batteries, our metallic and protective pigments and colorants, and more.

Being the larger company we are today and having a broader global reach doesn’t mean we’ve lost sight of what we do best, which is being uniquely positioned to help customers solve their toughest challenges. Day in and day out, I watch our talented, creative and incredibly dedicated employees partner with customers to ensure they get unique, high-performing solutions tailored to their exacting specifications. Take, for example, our custom engobes and glazes for bricks. As builders and homeowners desire an increasing variety of color and performance options in home materials, our customers must keep pace. And for the last 100 years, Vibrantz has been alongside our customers manufacturing products that improve the quality, vividness and color retention of bricks.

If you’re a customer, you likely interact with a Vibrantz team member and understand their impact on our ability to serve you. We thank you for your partnership and the continued opportunity to serve you. If you’re a Vibrantz employee, I am grateful for you. Our 5,000 colleagues around the world are why we are better for each other and customers. Your expertise, agility and optimism are the momentum helping us find certainty in today’s world. Here’s to moving the ball downfield…together.

David Newton

President, Advanced Materials

David Newton

President, Advanced Materials

Newton formerly served as vice president, global commercial for Advanced Materials at Vibrantz before assuming the role of President, Advanced Materials in September 2022. Prior to Vibrantz, Newton spent over 12 years at Ingevity where he was most recently vice president of corporate strategy and renewable energy ventures from 2020 to 2022, serving as a spearhead for technology scouting to drive the company’s growth initiatives. Also at Ingevity, Newton spent four years as vice president, commercial director and business manager for the company’s Performance Materials business unit and – from 2010 to 2017 – held various commercial and strategy leadership positions. 

Newton holds a Master of Business Administration in finance from the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler School of Business and a Bachelor and Master of Science in civil engineering from Clemson University.