About OCV

OCV™ Non-Woven Technologies is a world leading manufacturer of glass-based non-woven media.

The OCV™ Non-Woven Technologies business possesses a wealth of experience, expertise and technology but what we are most proud of is our ability to listen to our customers. It is this ability that allows us to create added value for our customers and reduce cost in the total value chain.

Nearly all of the non-woven products we manufacture are unique for each customer and application. Our business model is grounded in servicing individual customer needs. We take pride in working closely with our customers to develop value-added solutions and create partnerships that can transform markets.

Business Objectives

Our market-focused organization is designed to work closely with a diverse set of market-leading global customers to identify and design new solutions. A fundamental goal of this working partnership and in-depth customer knowledge is to identify opportunities to transform markets to composite materials. Our expertise allows us to take that knowledge and deliver customized solutions.

One of the first market transformations, and the largest to date, was the residential roofing market in the United States. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, roofing shingle manufacturers, led by Owens Corning, replaced organic felt in asphalt roofing shingles with non-woven glass fiber mats. These non-wovens offered a host of product improvements – better dimensional stability and increased tear strength, for example – which allowed for increased production line speeds and improved fire performance. In addition, because they needed less asphalt, glass fiber mats reduced cost.

At about the same time as the roofing market change, another transformation was taking place in Europe in the cushioned vinyl flooring market where all the main players converted their process to use fiberglass non-wovens.

Glass fiber non-wovens give flooring products improved dimensional stability, strength, better insulating and acoustic properties as well as enhanced comfort.

A market currently undergoing transformation is gypsum wallboard. Traditional wallboard is produced with a paper facing, but paper has two shortcomings: it absorbs moisture in humid environments and can support mold and mildew growth. Glass fiber non-wovens are unaffected by moisture and don’t support mold growth. In addition, they provide increased strength and stability which paper cannot achieve.

For the past few years, Owens Corning has been partnering with a leading gypsum board manufacturer to accelerate this transformation.