Vetting an Engineering Plastics Supplier in India: 2027 Checklist

More procurement teams in Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Türkiye, Germany, Mexico, Japan and Korea now have an Indian compounder on their shortlist. Part of the reason is the domestic market those compounders have grown up serving. India approved a ₹25,938 crore production-linked incentive scheme for automobiles and auto components in September 2021, running from FY2022-23 to FY2026-27. Trade policy matters too. India has a goods agreement with ASEAN (2010) and comprehensive partnership agreements with Japan (2011) and Korea, and India and the EU concluded free-trade negotiations in January 2026, with signature and ratification still to follow.

None of that qualifies a supplier. This is the checklist we would use ourselves, followed by our own answers.

The checklist

Three items that cause most of the trouble later

Certification status, stated precisely

IATF 16949 certificates are issued only through IATF-recognised certification bodies, and the IATF plans to publish a second edition of the standard in mid-2027. A supplier can be certified, in transition, or at gap-assessment stage. Any of these may be workable for a given programme, depending on your customer-specific requirements, but you need to know which one you are dealing with. India's MSME Sustainable (ZED) certification, awarded at Bronze, Silver and Gold levels, is a useful signal of process discipline in a smaller manufacturer. It does not replace an automotive quality system.

Declarations that stay current

RoHS currently restricts ten substances. Under REACH Article 33, a supplier of an article containing a Candidate List substance above 0.1% by weight must pass on safe-use information. The Candidate List grows over time, so ask how and when declarations are refreshed. For automotive parts, IMDS is the industry's material data system; agree early who creates the entry for the compound and what composition data it needs.

Incoterms and HS code on the pro forma

Incoterms 2020 has eleven rules. Name the rule, the place and the edition: "FCA [named place] Incoterms® 2020" leaves little room for argument. EXW puts export clearance on the buyer, which is awkward from abroad, and FOB, CFR and CIF are meant for sea and inland waterway transport only. Polyamides in primary forms sit under HS heading 39.08, with 3908.10 covering PA6 and PA66 and 3908.90 the other polyamides. Confirm with your broker how your customs authority treats a filled compound.

How All Around Polymer answers the checklist

• Quality system. ISO 9001:2015 certified and ZED certified. We state RoHS and REACH compliance; ask for the declaration covering your grade. IATF 16949: not certified. A gap assessment is scheduled. We would rather say that here than have it surface in your supplier audit.
• Testing. Three stages: incoming raw-material test reports, in-process and prototype tests, and random tests on finished product before dispatch. In-house equipment covers DSC, FT-IR, MFI, UTM (tensile and flexural), Izod impact, HDT/VSAT, spectrophotometric colour measurement and glow-wire, with injection moulding for specimen preparation. External laboratory testing on request.
• Traceability. ERP-controlled recipe versions, bills of materials and process windows, with batch genealogy through to the shipment.
• Capacity. Four twin-screw compounding lines with a combined nameplate of 1,975 kg/hr, about 9,500 tonnes a year in practice on a 16-hour pattern, across two owned plants in MET City, Jhajjar, Haryana. Unit 2 has spare capacity.
• Development. A trial formulation within 48–72 hours of a complete request. More than 150 new grades in four years, with 70–80% of development projects converting to supply.
• Export experience. Customers in Taiwan, Thailand, South Africa, Vietnam and Mexico; we exhibited at HanoiPlas 2025 in Hanoi.
• PPAP and IMDS. If your programme needs them, raise it at enquiry so the documentation is scoped into the development plan from the start.

The grades are in our material finder, from OSAMIDE polyamides to OSABATE PBT and OSAALLOY blends. The plant and process are described on our capabilities page and in inside a compounding line; development steps are in custom compound development.

FAQ