A magnified image of a ballpoint pen. (Photo : Getty Images)
It's a common knowledge that China makes every single thing in this world but to our surprise, it's a fact that China does not have the advanced machines to make such high-quality ballpoint pens.
Out of 3,000 pen manufacturers which produce around 40 billion pens a year, not one can make a ballpoint pen. Since the country lacks the advancement for it, they end up importing pen tips. As a result, 90 percent of China's pen tips are provided by foreign suppliers.
Xi Jundao, the manager of Beifa Group, one of China's biggest pen manufacturer said, "The stainless steel used to make pen tips was all imported from Japan."
In a television appearance of Premier Li Keqiang, he said that the need for ballpoint pens is a real situation. He said, "We cannot make ballpoint pens with a smooth writing function."
The dispute has finally ended through TISCO's work. TISCO stands for Taiyuan Iron & Steel Group and this company specializes in steel production and they have been trying to come up with a high-quality pen tip for five years.
TISCO merged with a national move to come up with a ballpoint pen tips that is made in China. Wang Huimian, TISCO's senior engineer said that finding the perfect formula was the toughest part.
Wang said, "We finally made a breakthrough at the end of 2014. Instead of using lumpy additives, their usual shape, we tried to cut them into smaller, linear pieces to get a better chemical interaction to make the steel stronger."
Last November, TISCO got approved by CMSI. CMSI is China's national steel standards committee. That was part of the plan to further develop the ballpoint pen's innovation.
As Li Jianmin, TISCO's Technology Director, said, "We are committed to becoming the leader in industrial steel materials through innovation."
