World-leading forest industry company UPM-Kymmene Corporation (UPM) sees attractive profitability and growth fundamentals in Asia-Pacific, making the region one of the geographical areas of focus of its expansion strategy. The UPM Paper Asia strategic business unit was created in late 2013 as part of a reorganisation and to show UPM's long-term commitment to the region.

"China is our largest market in Asia-Pacific," says Kim Poulsen, executive vice-president of UPM Paper Asia. "It offers enormous growth opportunities driven by a growing middle class and fast urbanisation, but the market is highly competitive. We have been and will be competitive in the marketplace by offering consistent product and service quality, delivery accuracy, leading environmental performance and exceptional customer experience."

Leveraging the strengths of UPM's global assets and capabilities, UPM Paper Asia is showing an overall positive development trend and to date accounts for 10 per cent of UPM's worldwide sales. UPM Paper Asia operates a large-scale and state-of-the-art paper mill at the Changshu Economic and Technological Development Zone in Jiangsu, with a production capacity of 800,000 tonnes per year. The business - which includes labelling and packaging materials production lines at UPM's Tervasaari and Jamsankoski mills in Finland, with 550,000 tonnes of capacity - caters to the expanding fine and office papers market in Asia and the labelling materials market globally. Also situated within the approximately 200-hectare Changshu site is the UPM Asia research and development centre that develops new products, materials and technologies in co-operation with customers and local institutes.