From the Sector

The winners of the prestigious Innovation Award for Fibre-Reinforced Plastics of the AVK, the German Federation of Reinforced Plastics, were presented in Salzburg this year. This award always goes to businesses, institutions and their partners for outstanding innovations in composites the three categories Products & Applications, Processes & Methods and Research & Science. Projects are submitted in all three categories and are evaluated by a jury of experts in engineering and science as well as trade journalists, who look at each project in terms of their levels of innovation, implementation and sustainability.

Products & Applications category
First place: “Insulating Coupling Shaft for Rail Vehicles” – Leichtbauzentrum Sachsen GmbH, partner: KWD Kupplungswerk Dresden GmbH

Second place: “Electric Car Battery Housing Components Based on Innovative Continuous Fibre-Reinforced Phenolic Resin Composites” – SGL Carbon

Third place: “High Performance Recycled Carbon Fibre Materials (HiPeR)” – Composites Technology Center GmbH (CTC GmbH), partners: Faserinstitut Bremen e. V, Sächsisches Textilforschungsinstitut e.V., C.A.R. FiberTec GmbH; partners Japan: Faserinstitut Bremen e.V., Sächsisches Textilforschungsinstitut e.V., C.A.R. FiberTec GmbH; Partner Japan: CFRI Carbon Fiber Recycle Industry Co., Ltd., IHI Logistics and Machinery Corporation, ICC Kanazawa Institute of Technology

Innovative Processes & Methods category
First place: “Chopped Fibre Direct Processing (CFP)” – KraussMaffei Technologies GmbH, partner: Wirthwein SE

Second place: “CIRC - Complete Inhouse Recycling of Thermoplastic Compounds” – Fraunhofer Institute for Production Engineering and Automation (IPA), partners: Schindler Handhabetechnik GmbH, Vision & Control GmbH

Third place: “CarboScreen – Sensor-Based Monitoring of Carbon-Fibre Production” – CarboScreen GmbH, partner: Institute of Textile Technology at RWTH Aachen University

Research & Science category
First place: “Development of a Stereocomplex PLA Blend on a Pilot Plant Scale” – Faserinstitut Bremen e. V.

Second place: “Fibre-Reinforced Salt as a Robust Lost Core Material” – Technical University of Munich, Chair of Carbon Composites, partners: Apppex GmbH, Haas Metallguss GmbH

Third place: “VliesSMC – Recycled Carbon Fibres with a Second Life in the SMC Process” – Sächsisches Textilforschungsinstitut e.V. (STFI), partner: Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology (ICT)

Entries for the next Innovation Award 2024 can be submitted from January 2024 onwards.

• Free trade deal boosts export potential

The time is right for Swiss textile machinery companies to grow their export business with Indonesia – one of the world’s top 10 textile producers. A free trade agreement between the two countries came into force in 2021, and market analyses show that there is scope for a significant increase in business in textile and textile machinery sectors.

This was the background to a successful symposium in the Indonesian capital Jakarta last month when Swiss Textile Machinery Association members presented their products and innovations to an invited audience of 200 delegates from Indonesian textile companies.

The symposium audience was welcomed by Philippe Strub, of the Swiss Embassy in Indonesia; Ignatius Warsito, from the Indonesia Ministry of Industry’s Chemical, Pharmaceutical and Textile Industry branch; Anne Patricia Sutanto, of the Indonesian Textile Association (API); and Ernesto Maurer, President of the Swiss Textile Machinery Association.

Swiss companies taking part were: Stäubli, Zeta Datatec, Loepfe, Saurer, Benninger, Rieter, Bräcker, Jakob Müller, Maag, Uster and SERV.

The presentations were followed by panel discussions with speakers, and there were also networking opportunities at the companies’ exhibition tables.

Also taking part in a panel at the event was Testex, the independent Swiss organisation which provides testing, certification, OEKO-TEX® and other labels for the textile industry. Discussion focused on the relevance of innovation in textile technology to sustainability and ‘saving the planet.’  

Recent years have seen an acceleration in trade relations between Switzerland and Indonesia, which in 2008 was classed as one of eight priority countries for economic development cooperation by SECO, the Swiss Secretariat for Economic Affairs, with a joint economic and trade commission established the following year.
Collaboration was heightened further in 2018 with a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) for Indonesia with Switzerland and the other EFTA countries. This more extensive form of free trade agreement was accepted after a popular referendum, and ultimately came into force in November 2021.

Trading between the two countries is supported by SERV, the Swiss export risk insurance organisation. This insures export goods against political and commercial risks and facilitates credit.

Cornelia Buchwalder, Secretary General of the Swiss Textile Machinery Association, said the Indonesia Symposium was ideally-timed, right after the CEPA came into effect: “With the free trade agreement in place, there is even greater potential for the development of trade between our countries,” she said.

“Business in textile and textile machinery is actually below the relative market shares for the sectors, so this stronger cooperation is probably overdue. It was a successful symposium, with enthusiastic participation from Indonesian textile companies, so we are optimistic about future export prospects for Swiss textile machinery.”

AMAC cooperates with ITA (Institute for Textile Technology of RWTH Aachen University and their ITA GmbH) for the business development in composites 

As of April 19th, 2021, AMAC is pleased to announce its cooperation with the Institute for Textile Technology, ITA, of RWTH Aachen University and their ITA GmbH. The aim of the cooperation is to strengthen and develop their business activities in composites.

ITA, as one of the largest institutes on the campus of the excellence University RWTH Aachen, Germany, develops complete solutions from the manufacturing of the fiber itself over the processing of textile intermediates with thermoplastic and thermoset resins, textile-based part manufacturing, capabilities such as braiding, pultrusion and in-situ impregnation of textile preforms. Top 3 focused industries are transportation and particularly the e-mobility sector, building and construction as well as the wind energy sector. Additionally, ITA GmbH is the partner of the industry in R&D, focusing on 8 business segments, providing technology and knowledge transfer, as well as offering comprehensive solutions along the entire textile value chain.

Prof. Dr. Thomas Gries, Director of ITA, explains the background of the strategic cooperation with focus on composites: „Our long-term experience and unmatched know-how with all aspects of continuous fibers, non-wovens and web-based reinforcements allows us to deliver to the composite manufacturers a complete technology and service offer around the development of technical textiles, from the development of glass and carbon fibers to the textile-based processing of composite parts. In all process steps of our research and developments, we focus on sustainable and recyclable solutions, an efficient cost-performance ratio, the possible use of bio-based materials and the reduction of the CO2 footprint. We are glad to cooperate with Dr. Michael Effing and AMAC in order to benefit from his door-opening network in the composites industry. “

Dr. Michael Effing, Managing Director of AMAC GmbH: „I am very happy to support the ITA to generate innovation thanks to further industrial networking and pre-competitive joint projects. ITA is indeed a one-stop source for composite solutions from the fiber to the cost-efficient manufacturing of final parts. In the context of the Covid-19 impact to the entire industry, it makes sense to bundle forces. Furthermore, ITA, with its long tradition and satisfied customers offers further valuable networking opportunities to the composites industry as well as access to relevant complementary fiber-based excellence and 250 different technologies in their machine-park with an outstanding infrastructure in Aachen.”