TopCon 2025: The Future is Bright for Thermosets

Ci-Dell President Ken Cihlar, Jr. and I had the pleasure of attending the SPE Thermoset TopCon 2025 conference recently in Madison, Wis. TopCon always provides a special opportunity to dig deep into the world of thermoset technology, talk with industry leaders and innovators, and gather insights that will inform our next steps in the business.  I’ve attended nearly 15 TopCon conferences in my career, and I think this year’s event was one of the best. 

We want to share with our customers and the broader community key information we learned and how it will shape the industry in the near and distant future.

1. Thermosets for emerging markets

Historically, thermosets have been the preferred material in many electric and electronic applications because they’re heat resistant and provide electric insulation. Two emerging industries are considering thermoset compounds over metals and thermoplastics, which could create a large boom in the thermoset market:

• Data centers:  As the demand for cloud computing, AI and big data continue to boom, data centers are popping up around the world. Thermoset components in data centers can provide the thermal stability, electrical insulation, flame retardancy and long life at lower cost than metal or thermoplastics.
• EV battery enclosures: As electric vehicle designs continue to evolve, design elements are still under development. To date, many have chosen aluminum extrusions for battery boxes, but engineers are looking for alternative materials. Thermoset enclosures for EV battery enclosures are just as light weight but less costly than aluminum while providing electric insulation and thermal stability. 

2. Research advances in prepreg thermosets

Pre-impregnated polymers have been used for a while now to strengthen thermosets and improve impact resistance. The performance characteristics of prepreg thermosets are impressive, and the auto and aerospace industries are increasingly taking notice. Presenters at TopCon 2025 shared information about new woven fiber thermoset prepregs that are being used in aerospace applications with a focus on growing into other industrial applications.

What this means: These materials are lowering in cost, but are still not appropriate for many applications due to negative cost-to-benefit ratio.  At Ci-Dell, we don’t offer prepreg thermosets at this time, but we’re monitoring the progress of this material and will make it available to customers when we feel it is an appropriate and cost-effective option for our customers. Today, we offer phenolic, polyester and epoxy resins that can be reinforced with carbon fibers, fiberglass and other materials.

3. Thermoset’s role in sustainability

Thermosets provide opportunities to reach government and company sustainability goals in a variety of ways:

• Lightweighting: According to a case study shared at TopCon 2025 by Amanda Nummy, senior polymer materials engineer at Hyundai America Technical Center, the auto maker was looking for a way to lightweight its trucks to improve fuel economy. To find a new material for truck bed liners, Nummy’s team did extensive testing and ultimately chose reinforced thermosets because it offered a good balance of cost and weight savings, as well as high durability and longevity.

• Renewable ingredients: In a presentation by Triton Stormwater Solutions founder  Joe Miskovich at TopCon 2025, the company chose a soy-infused thermoset to develop its new stormwater chamber panels because it’s non-toxic, biodegradable and strong as steel. 

• LEED certification: Due to its long life, lower energy to produce and lighter weight than some other materials, thermoset components in select applications can contribute to LEED credits or certifications.

• Renewable energy expansion: Thermoset components have the potential to grow due to more infrastructure for renewable energy distribution, as well as solar panel components.

What this means

We expect the demand for thermosets to go up in several  industries, which means a growing demand for raw material production and molding services. Unstable supply chains and international tariffs are already driving more companies to find domestic sources for these materials, so we can expect to see more inexperienced material suppliers popping up to take advantage of the opportunity. 

At Ci-Dell, we’ve foreseen the impending need for more domestic molding, so we’ve invested in new molding press technology and automation to increase our capacity and control costs. We’re ready to take on more thermoset parts for data centers, EVs and any other industry that needs our help developing molded thermoset parts on-time and on budget.

If we can help you review a new project and find out if thermoset compounds are right for your application, please contact us.