From the Sector

Happy New Year 2024! Here's to a year full of innovation and success in the textile and apparel industry.

The Textination team sincerely wishes you a great start: may 2024 be full of health, joy and energy for you.

There are undoubtedly 365 days of exciting encounters, developments, innovations and new trends ahead in our shared world of the textile and apparel industry. We would like to join you on this journey and document the many facets of our industry.

We are convinced that the new year will be just as fascinating and inspiring for our users as the best textile products and designs that our industry has to offer. We look forward to accompanying you through the coming 12 months with the latest news, in-depth analyses and exclusive insights.

Thank you for your continued support and interest in Textination.

Together we will tell textile tomorrow!

Ines Chucholowius
- Managing Director -

• Lenzing again recognized for sustainable sourcing, innovation and transparency
• Lenzing achieves the highest category for the third time already

The Lenzing Group achieved first place in the “Hot Button Ranking” of the Canadian non-profit organization Canopy, thus confirming its leading role in the areas of sustainability and responsible wood and pulp sourcing. Lenzing can also once again celebrate a dark green shirt, synonymous with the highest category.

In this ranking, which receives a lot of attention in the textile and apparel industry, Canopy evaluates the world’s 34 largest producers of cellulosic fibers in terms of their sustainable wood and pulp sourcing, their efforts with regard to the use of alternative raw materials and their achievements in the protection of ancient and endangered forests. Resource preservation is a key element of Lenzing’s corporate strategy and at the core of its innovation agenda. The sustainable production of TENCEL™, VEOCEL™ and LENZING™ ECOVERO™branded specialty fibers is based on these principles.

Promoting the circular economy
With its REFIBRA™ and Eco Cycle technologies, Lenzing offers solutions for transforming the textile and nonwovens industries towards a circular economy. In line with its vision for the circular economy, “We give waste a new life. Every day.” Lenzing is driving the industry toward a full circular economy by striving to give waste a new life in all aspects of its core business and developing circular solutions together with potential partners inside and outside the current value chain. A milestone on this path is the cooperation with the Swedish pulp producer Södra. The two global market leaders, who have been proactively promoting the circular economy in the fashion industry for many years, are joining forces to give the topic a further boost and make a decisive contribution to solving the global textile waste problem by making fibers from post-consumer textiles.

Today, Lenzing offers lyocell fibers made from 30 percent recycled cotton waste. The company aims to launch lyocell, modal and viscose staple fibers with up to 50 percent recycled post-consumer content on a commercial scale by 2025 and to develop a new circular business model by closing the loops for post-consumer waste. By 2025, the company plans to enter into further partnerships with 25 key supply chain companies.

• Strong operating result: EBITDA at EUR 217.8 mn, cash flow from operating activities at EUR 199.8 mn
• Major strategic projects continue fully on track – production start of the lyocell plant in Thailand in the fourth quarter of 2021
• Start of strategic cooperation agreement for textile recycling with Södra
• New milestones in the implementation of group-wide carbon neutrality: EUR 200 mn investment in existing locations in Asia
• Guidance 2021: Lenzing expects EBITDA of at least EUR 360 mn

The Lenzing Group reported a significant improvement in revenue and earnings in the first half of the year. Growing optimism in the textile and apparel industry and the ongoing recovery in retail caused a substantial increase in demand and prices on the global fiber market, in particular at the beginning of the current financial year.

Revenue rose by 27.5 percent to EUR 1.03 bn in the first half of 2021. This increase is primarily attributable to higher viscose prices, which stood at more than RMB 15,000 in May thanks to significantly higher demand for fibers, especially in Asia. The focus on wood-based specialty fibers such as TENCEL™, LENZING™ ECOVERO™ and VEOCEL™ branded fibers also had a positive impact on the revenue development; the share of specialty fibers in fiber revenue rose to 72.8 percent in the reporting period. The negative impact of more unfavorable currency effects was consequently more than offset.

The earnings development essentially reflects the positive market development and was additionally reinforced by measures to improve efficiency. Energy and logistics costs increased significantly throughout the entire reporting period. EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization) more than doubled and amounted to EUR 217.8 mn in the first half of 2021 (compared to EUR 95.6 mn in the first half of 2020). The EBITDA margin rose from 11.8 percent to 21.1 percent. Net profit for the period amounted to EUR 96.1 mn (compared to a net loss of EUR minus 14.4 mn in the first half of 2020) and earnings per share to EUR 3.06 (compared to EUR 0.06 in the first half of 2020).

“Lenzing had a very strong first half-year. The demand for our sustainably produced specialty fibers once again developed excellently,” says Stefan Doboczky, CEO of the Lenzing Group.