Painting The World

Oscar Wezenbeek has no trouble painting a picture about AkzoNobel paints, as he’s been with the company for three decades.

- Wendy Kay

When is watching paint dry exciting? When it’s viewed through the eyes of Oscar Wezenbeek. He’s the Managing Director of AkzoNobel Decorative Paints for South-East and South Asia and is as passionate about his product today as the day he joined the company three decades ago.

“If it drives, floats or flies, we cover it,” he enthuses. “Even the mobile phone you’ve got in your hands is probably coated by us. We provide the whole spectrum, from the regular paints consumers require to decorate their homes, to the high-performance coatings to protect sensitive equipment.

“We’re the market leaders in coating aeroplanes,” Oscar adds. “Imagine an aeroplane taking off in tropical weather here in Singapore and within a matter of minutes it flies all the way up to 9,000 metres where it’s cold, or maybe even hailing. The metal is expanding and shrinking as it passes through all those extremes, so you need a durable paint that can withstand all these varying conditions within a short period.”

When not flying the skies, AkzoNobel’s paints are coating Singapore’s Burkill Hall, Sydney’s Harbour Bridge, Malacca’s Stadthuys, Milan’s La Scala, The New York Times Building, the London Eye and the world’s largest ferris wheel, still under construction, the Dubai Eye.