From the Sector

Anita Tillmann on the new season, new topics and a new generation.

“We’re feeling a special vibe in Berlin at the moment. The new generation is cool, fresh, engaged. Despite the fact that we, in our 40s, 50s and up, wear the same sneakers and almost the same look as our children, it's a long time since we topped the cool list. We need the young crowd, these stars of tomorrow, their style, their ideas and their unconventional and open ways of thinking. Everyone should come to Berlin to meet them, listen to them, or at least watch them. If you only look to the past you won't create a good future.”

CRAFTING STORIES.
“Berlin feels reckless, flexible, sometimes wonderfully aimless, unconstrained and unpredictable, which gives my creativity a huge boost. I am fascinated by always meeting people from all over the world who have chosen to make Berlin their base so that they can be free and creative, because Berlin offers the space to do that – whether in a studio, or at WeWork or Berghain.”

CHANGING STORIES.
“Only 9 per cent of the 9.1 billion tonnes of waste plastic that accumulates around the world was recycled and 12 per cent was incinerated. We give talks daily on the theme of avoiding plastic and we are working with the City of Berlin on concepts for a plastic-free Fashion Week. Only together can we shake things up.”

TELLING STORIES.
“Emotionalisation begins at the trade show stand rather than in-store. If the sparks don't fly at the trade show it will be tricky to tell the brand story or implement the presentation of the brands across the sales areas. Firstly, the aim is to use key looks and storytelling to capture buyers’ attention and make statements. We are working together with the brands on showcasing differentiating factors and genuinely presenting something new. Secondly, we recommend bringing young sales staff along to Berlin as well, to internalise this dynamic as well as the brand stories; and to then make these stories come alive for end consumers across the sales areas.”

At next month’s Techtextil 2019 in Frankfurt, Germany, A. Monforts Textilmaschinen GmbH & Co. KG will be highlighting all of the innovative features that have made the Montex stenter the undisputed leader in the field of technical fabric finishing.

“Techtextil is a very important show for us, because technical textiles are a key pillar of our production programme and many of our existing customers will be exhibiting or attending, as well as those we have yet to meet,” says Jürgen Hanel, Head of Technical Textiles at Monforts. “The show provides us with an opportunity to explain the diverse end-products that can be successfully finished on our stenters, as well as with our coating units.”

A number of successful recent Monforts Montex stenter installations in Europe, for example, are dedicated to the production of wide-width digital printing substrates, to high volume automotive fabrics and to heavy duty filter media, to name just three advanced technical materials.

Digital print
Three Montex stenters have just been installed at the plant of a leading finisher of substrates for digital printing substrates in Germany – two of them in extra-wide widths of 5.4 metres – for drying after both washing and coating processes.

A new standard in pure white, 100% clean and fault-free textile substrates has been demanded in recent years by the rapid growth in digitally-printed banners and hoardings – often referred to as ‘soft signage’.

“The substrates of choice for digital printing are 100% polyester warp knits which have extremely smooth surfaces,” says Hanel. “This is becoming increasingly critical due to the general move away from PVC coatings which were the standard in the past. Quality inspection and control systems analyse every square metre of fabric to ensure completely uniform and blemish-free production.”

The fabrics produced are resilient and allow excellent take-up of inks for vibrant colours and clear and precise images to be achieved with digital printing techniques. The knitted construction also has the advantage of elasticity, which is a plus in terms of flexibility for soft signage installers.
These fabrics are being supplied fully finished, in weights of between 50-350gsm and in rolls of up to 600kg or 1,800 metres.

• essenscia Innovation Award is Belgium’s most prestigious prize for industrial innovation
• UltraBond is a cost-effective solution for fully recyclable, latex-free, sustainable carpets
• Significant reductions in ecological footprint and cost for carpet manufacturers

Beaulieu Fibres International, Europe’s largest producer of polyolefin fibres, was nominated for the 2019 essenscia Innovation Award for its recently introduced UltraBond fibre.

The biannual award is the most prestigious prize for industrial innovation in Belgium. Created by essenscia, the Belgian Federation for Chemistry and Life Sciences industries, it aims to promote innovations in the Belgian industry and encourages companies to invest even more in innovative and sustainable products and applications. During the evaluation of the nominated innovation projects, the jury assesses their link with chemistry, life sciences and materials, their contribution to sustainable development, their intellectual property management strategy as well as their added value for the economy.

Formally introduced in early 2019, UltraBond is a patented polyolefin bonding staple fibre that eliminates the need for latex or other chemical binders to bond nonwovens. It enables carpet manufacturers to create 100% PP needlepunch carpets that meet the same performance requirements as traditional constructions, while also reducing end-of-life environmental impact.

UltraBond helps manufacturers make a significant contribution to the circular economy through the production of 100% recyclable carpets. In addition to making recycled PP available for the plastics production chain and reduced waste generation, their total lack of water use and reduced energy use result in significant environmental advantages and financial savings. There is also a reduction in the VOC level of the carpet. This all leads to a significant reduction in a needlepunch carpet’s ecological footprint to the tune of a 35% reduction in CO2 emissions during the full production process.

• New game-changing Kornit NeoPoly Technology with industry-first innovation for industrial polyester printing that prevents dye migration.
• New Kornit Avalanche Poly Pro system unveiled at events during April, commercially available immediately.

Kornit Digital Ltd. (NASDAQ: KRNT), a global market leader in digital textile printing innovation, unveiled the game-changing Kornit NeoPoly Technology, which is the industry’s first digital, industrial process for high-quality printing on polyester.

Polyester is the second largest category in the overall T-shirt market, it is key in the sport segment, and is growing in the athleisure and functional apparel segments. Currently polyester is printed predominantly by analog solutions, which creates major technological, cost and sustainability challenges.  

The new ground-breaking Kornit NeoPoly Technology addresses these challenges with a new process and ink set implemented in the renowned Kornit NeoPigmentTM process. Kornit’s new process handles polyester applications without compromising on design, run size, substrate or labor.

The breakthrough technological innovation is achieved by an innovative ink set and a physical and chemical process specifically developed for low temperature curing, and polyester enhancing functionalities developed to maintain fabric characteristics and provide superior fastness. This unique process prevents dye migration on polyester.  The inks are Oeko-Tex and Eco-Passport certified and do not contain PVCs or other toxic ingredients.

The first system equipped with the Kornit NeoPoly Technology is the new Kornit Avalanche Poly Pro, a member of Kornit’s world-class reliable, highly productive industrial platform. The single-step Poly Pro is the perfect system for the industry, enabling easy and cost effective short-runs and on-demand printing on polyester garments.

China is the world’s undisputed front-runner in the global car market, leading the way in both production and sales. 2018 saw 27.8 million vehicles produced and domestic sales of 28.1 million, and while these numbers were down slightly year-on-year, the opportunities for global textile producers are still unrivalled given the overall size of the market. These opportunities can best be explored at this year’s biennial China International Nonwovens Expo & Forum (CINE – supported by Techtextil), which runs from 3 – 5 June in Shanghai.
While CINE features nonwovens & nonwoven products, machinery for nonwovens and raw materials & chemicals for nonwovens for a wide range of applications, it is the potential in the automotive sector that is generating a lot of talk before this June’s event. And considering only around 50% of demand for automotive textiles is met by domestic output, the opportunities for imports from overseas suppliers is high.

While new car sales in China dropped for the first time last year since 1992, production still reached 27.8 million vehicles, including 23.5 million passenger cars and 4.3 million commercial vehicles. Furthermore, strong growth is still evident in new energy vehicle (NEV) sales, as well as exports of all vehicle types. NEV production totalled 1.27 million units last year, a staggering 60% increase, while sales grew by nearly 62%. More e-vehicles are sold in China than rest of the world combined, while the government recently set a target of selling 7 million e-vehicles by 2025, ensuring growth in this sector will remain robust for some time. Exports of all vehicle types in 2018 did not grow as fast as NEVs, but the 1.04 million vehicles produced for overseas markets last year still represented growth of 16.8%.

Premium automotive industry buyers attend CINE
Given CINE’s strong reputation in the Chinese nonwovens sector, a number of leading automobile brands, and textile suppliers to these companies, source at the fair. Previous buyers have included Autoliv, Honeywell, Johnson Controls, Lear Corporation, Lydall, Toyota Boshoku, Volkswagen, Wangbo Co Ltd and more.

This edition, buyers such as these can source from a range of automotive nonwovens suppliers. This includes Shanghai Shenda, one of the country’s largest producer of automotive textiles, who will group together a number of automotive interior suppliers.

This year the fair will take place in a new venue, the Shanghai Convention & Exhibition Center of International Sourcing, located conveniently between Hongqiao airport and downtown Shanghai. Visitor registration for the fair is now open and can be accessed here: http://vis.eastfair.com/CINEPCEN/reg.aspx.

This year, AZL won the JEC AWARD 2019 for the development of the new machine system “Ultra-Fast Consolidator Machine”. This innovative machine system is a result of an 18-months AZL Joint Partner Project, conducted in 2017-2018 by the research partners AZL Aachen and Fraunhofer IPT Aachen, in cooperation with industrial partner companies including Conbility, Covestro, Engel, Evonik, Fagor Arrasate, Faurecia SE, Laserline, Mitsui Chemicals, Mubea Carbo Tech, Philips Photonics, SSDT and Toyota (in alphabetical order).

The new UItra-Fast Consolidator Machine offers both high flexibility and mass production of tailored thermoplastic laminates with reduced scrap. Fully consolidated multi-layer laminates with different fiber directions and minimized scrap (tailored blanks) can be produced in cycle times below 5 seconds with this new scalable machine setup. This individualized mass production is accomplished by a combination of laser-assisted tape placement with in-situ consolidation and a piece-flow principle, which is state of the art in the printing industry but has not been used in such a way within composite production. The achievable productivity is enhanced to more than 500 kg/hour by this piece-flow principle with carriers moved through multiple application stations which are equipped with multiple tape placement applicators. The new machine is scalable: multiple application stations can be added, e.g. for each layer one station for mass production or for each fiber direction one station with a carrier-conveyor carousel: here the carriers are moved multiple times through the application stations.

The system will be commercialized by some of the industrial partners in 2019. The real machine setup has been presented at the AZL booth during the JEC Exhibition in Paris 2019.

The follow-up project has just started and is still open to join for industrial partners. This follow-up project comprises a further upscale of the machine system as well as a preparation of the commercialization by long-term durability tests and further process optimizations using different tape materials.

Outgoing 2018-19 National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) Chairman Marty Moran delivered the trade association’s 2019 State of the U.S. Textile Industry overview at NCTO’s 16th Annual Meeting on March 21st at the Capital Hilton in Washington, DC.

Mr. Moran’s speech outlined (1) U.S. textile supply chain economic, employment and trade data, (2) the 2019 policy priorities of domestic textile manufacturers, and (3) other NCTO activities.  

A link to his remarks as prepared for delivery are included in this press statement along with a link to a data infographic prepared by NCTO illustrating the current economic status of the U.S. textile industry.

Mr. Moran is CEO of Buhler Quality Yarns, Corp., a fine-count yarn supplier headquartered in Jefferson, Georgia with plants and/or offices in America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

NCTO is a Washington, DC-based trade association that represents domestic textile manufacturers.  

• U.S. employment in the textile supply chain was 594,147 in 2018.  
• The value of shipments for U.S. textiles and apparel was $76.8 billion in 2018.  
• U.S. exports of fiber, textiles and apparel were $30.1 billion in 2018.  
• Capital expenditures for textile and apparel production totaled $2.0 billion in 2017, the last year for which data is available.

Die IDEA, die vom 25. – 28. März in Miami Beach, Florida USA, stattfindet, begann für Oerlikon Nonwoven mit einem Vertragsabschluss. Der Kunde, ein renommierter Meltblown Spezialist aus Europa, investiert in eine Zwei-Balken Meltblown Anlage vom Neumünsteraner Anlagenbauer, um seiner stark steigenden Nachfrage durch diese Kapazitätserweiterung gerecht zu werden. Auf der Anlage sollen zukünftig Meltblown Vliese für eine Vielzahl von Anwendungen, insbesondere aus dem Filtrations- und Wipesbereich, produziert werden. Der kommerzielle Produktionsstart ist für die erste Jahreshälfte 2020 geplant. Der Markt für Meltblown Vliese wächst durchschnittlich mit 6% im Jahr.

• Exclusive market insights, best practices and inspirational thoughts, alongside previews of Kornit’s new dedicated polyester printing technology

Kornit Digital, (NASDAQ: KRNT), a global market leader in digital textile printing technology, invites all textile printers, garment decorators, Kornit users, prospective customers and anyone who is curious about the latest trends and technology in digital textile printing, to its “Kornit Discover” events.

Taking place April 3-4 in the New York Metropolitan area, April 11-12 in Duesseldorf, Germany and April 15-17 in Hong Kong, each event will feature educational workshops with real-world insights delivered by high-level guest speakers. Highlighting the North American event will be a keynote by Breakaway Sports owner Scott Goldstone, multiple case study presentations, and a panel discussion with editors of key publications serving the imprinted apparel industry. The European event will feature a keynote called “The Future of Retail” by futurist Kai Gondlach, a digital transformation review of the textile industry by Tansy Fall, editor-in-chief of Digital Textile 4.0 and an insightful chat with Kornit user Shirtracer, Nuremburg. The Asian instance will feature Ron Gilboa as main speaker and Kornit’s customer Paintory.

Omer Kulka, Kornit Digital’s Vice President of Marketing and Product Strategy, said: “There are still a lot of perceptions and opinions in the market about direct-to-garment printing and what its opportunities and limitations are. Printing on dark polyester is a prime example: there is an opinion in the market that digital printing and dark poly don’t go well together, and we just lifted this barrier. With Kornit Discover, we are creating an industry event that will challenge these established thinking patterns. In fact, we will transform the way visitors think and print!”

On the international stage of JEC World, composite innovation is everywhere! On the planets, on the live demo zones, on the stands, and also on stage... During this second day of the world's largest composites exhibition, the winners of the JEC Innovation Awards were announced.

JEC Innovation Awards celebrate the fruitful cooperation between players of the composite community. Over the past 15 years, the JEC Innovation Awards have brought in 1,800 companies worldwide. 177 companies and 433 partners have been rewarded for the excellence of their composite innovations. The JEC Innovation Awards reward composites champions, based on criteria such as partner involvement in the value chain, technicality or commercial applications of innovations.

The ceremony was opened by Bertrand Piccard, the founder and visionary behind Solar Impulse, the first zero-fuel aircraft with perpetual autonomy.

The jury then announced the ten composite innovation champions selected among 30 finalists, from more than a hundred entries, and the public awarded its prize.
"JEC Group supports innovation and has created the Composites Reference Prize to reward industry champions and promote their innovations. Every year, we receive more than a hundred applications from all over the world," explains Franck Glowacz, Composites Expert at JEC Group.

Download the PDF to see all winning companies.