Global textile machinery manufacturers

After the exclusion of global quota scheme, the textile industry is flourishing at high speed. The world is on a new corridor of industrial revolution. Analysts are anticipating more expansion with latest technologies in Textile Machineries. The textile machinery manufacturing hubs like China, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and India have already jumped in gigantic competition to craft and bid best technologies in textile machineries. Global Industry Analysts, Inc. (GIA) has declared that the global bazaar for textile machinery is estimated to reach US$22.9 billion by 2017.Demand for sophisticated machines that produce high quality cloth is increasing. Whatever is the technology, the purchasing decision is greatly influenced by the machines’ versatility, flexibility, and price offers. Key factors for dynamic growth in the textile machinery market contain economic revival post recession, rising demand for nonwoven disposable textile products, increasing demand from promising regions, especially Asia-Pacific, and going up demand for environmentally-friendly fibers.This article analyzes some of the world leading textile machinery manufacturing countries.

China is going high-tech in both textile machinery and products:

The Chinese textile manufacturers are developing some of the best answers in technical aspects of textile industry, along with very competitive prices. With the rapid expansion of textile industry, China’s textile machinery industry also enjoys an occasion for development, and become the world’s largest textile machinery manufacturer. China started industrialized machine virtually 80 years ago. At present, China-made textile machinery and equipment account for 80 percent of domestic textile machinery market. But, the industry is facing 50 percent less of sales share, and only 15 percent of gross margin, so loss coverage is high

China is still the biggest machinery manufacturer in the global textile arena. Many countries in Asia are facing adjustment of product structure, so demand of high-end and complete sets of textile machinery are in demand. Chinese industry has obvious advantages compared with textile trade powers of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Turkey, particularly in cotton spinning equipment, complete sets of polyester equipment and dyeing-printing equipment due to price.

As China is clearly emphasizing on high tech and high value added products, textile machinery would be a key area for the country to focus this year and onward. Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China specifies that the percentage of high-tech products in sales should increase from original 40 percent to 60 percent and the proportion of research and development fund of high-tech products in total corporate sales should increase from original 2 percent to 5 percent each year.

China is not only exporter of textile machinery but also a potential importer of textile machinery. The potential import markets for textile machineries were Chinese provinces like Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Guangdong, which accounted for roughly 71% of the China’s overall textile machinery imports. The last year machinery manufacturers experienced orders pouring in and the market witnessed attention of the world on Chinese machinery. Many leading machinery manufacturers around the world chose China for expanding their production base and established their manufacturing unit in China. Rapid industrialization and subsequent economic development in China over the last decade has contributed to a significant rise in Asian textile production. China Government initiatives such as China’s 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) which prioritizes technological advancement and improvement in craftsmanship and equipment on par with the international levels for textile and other industry sectors is expected to turnmomentous growth in the Asian market.

China is clearly focusing more on technical textiles and use of high tech automation in textile manufacturing, hence machineries for those industries will move towards China. Recently Shanghai has become one of the most fashion conscious cities in Asia. As China is producing fabric and apparels and look for value addition, they are moving for fast fashion products hence investments would take place for those production lines.

India looks forward to improve in technology:

Indian textile machinery industry is more than 50 years old and the industry is increasing day by day. About 750 machinery and equipment manufacturing units are in India, of which over 250 units produce complete machines, and the rest produce parts and accessories. Textile machinery manufacturing sector at present is meeting 45-50 per cent of the overall demand of the domestic textile industry, whose main constituent is ginning, spinning, weaving and processing. The country is very good in manufacturing accessories, machine mountings & consumable parts but still the sector needs further development producing weaving machinery (shuttleless looms) and some high- tech processing machinery.

India’s machinery exporters, though, have been employing various strategies to make sure that they remain competitive in the liberalized trading environment of 2013 and beyond. Many manufacturers are taking action for improving production efficiency through advanced automatic system, re-engineering of manufacturing systems, merging separate production units and  Scheme for modernisation, technology upgradation and productivity advancement in anticipation of enhanced demand in 2013 and beyond among other manufacturer are seeking changes through Encouragement to the old used technology even for modernization under the subsidy scheme, encouragement to the decentralized  power loom sector to expand its capacity with obsolete technology and some of are planning to raise added value by setting up joint ventures with foreign firms, to take benefit of their technical, design and marketing proficiency. Others are making relationships with foreign importers to increase their marketing capability.

As a textile product manufacturer, India faced some export decay during global economic slump during 2009-10, but then they recovered and remained slightly above the target during 2010-11. In the 2011-12 fiscal year the country has fulfilled the target of export of textiles and garments to around USD 28-30 billion. The US and EU, account for about two third of India’s textiles exports. The other major export destinations are Canada, UAE, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Republic of Korea, Bangladesh and Turkey.

India is not only exporter of textile machinery but also importer of the textile machinery. Textile machinery import has risen from US$ 0.92billion during 2010-2011 to US$1.38billion (estimated) during 2011-2012. Exports during 2011-2012 were estimated at US$ 147 million as against US$ 168 million achieved during 2010-2011.The gloomy global market is responsible for lower exports.

Italian textile machinery industry grows strongly:

Italian textile machinery industrial sector is one of the foremost machinery manufacturers comprising around 300 companies (employing roughly 12,400 people) and producing machinery for an overall value of US$ 3.41 billion per year, with exports amounting to 80% of total sales. The quality of Italian textile technology is evidenced by the high number of countries in which Italian machinery is sold: around 130 countries worldwide.

Exports were always the driving force behind the sector’s growth in Italy. The enthusiasm of major textile markets, combined with the capability of Italian machinery manufacturers to assert them on a global scale, contributed to sustained growth in exports. Almost 25 per cent of the sector’s sales abroad are directed to China, with Asian markets generally accounting for 50 per cent of all foreign sales.

During the fourth quarter of 2012, the orders index for textile machinery rose by 22 per cent compared to the previous quarter. Even more significant was the increase with respect to the same period of the previous year (+46 per cent).

Overall orders also benefitted from a positive trend on the domestic market, for which a 47 per cent increase was actually recorded compared to the three previous months. Growth on foreign markets was slightly more contained at +20 per cent. Whereas the value of Italian textile machinery production for 2011 registered a 9 per cent increase compared to 2010, from US$ 3.072 to US$ 3.328 billion. A similar increase was recorded for exports (+10 per cent), valued at just over US$ 2.688 billion.

In contrast, Demand has remained especially weak from the domestic market. In Italy, as throughout the European Union in general, current economic uncertainty is hindering a recovery in investments, even in the textile industry. In spite of the growth experienced in 2012, Italian machinery manufacturers remain extremely cautious for the current year.

Spain tries to increase its capacity in textile machine manufacturing:

Spanish textile machinery industry has thrived with the arrangement of small and medium sized companies with the strength of less than 50 employees. These companies are still looking very hard competition with the world leaders to attain the international standards of price, design, quality and service. Weaving machine spare parts, knitting, sewing, accessories and spinning are the different categories integrated under the textile machinery sector of Spain. About 80 machinery companies gain fiscal credit value 260 million Euros in the Spain.

The exports in the countries like Latin America, North America and Middle East is also noteworthy. New destinations like USA, Mexico, France, Turkey and India have new developing markets which are the motives for the go up in the demand of evolution.

Dyeing and finishing sector consists of 35 companies and is the leading sector of country. The other sector which follows it is a spinning machinery section with 25 companies. Both sub sectors has aneventual for new innovations in the machinery. The export of machinery in Spain is of 70% of its total production.

Germany provides reliable technology in machine manufacturing:

Germany has jumped out as acrucial manufacturer of textile machinery and has secured its place by the 5th rank worldwide in machinery export.The key strengths of German machinery manufacturers become obvious if one considers the entire life cycle of a machine. During the entire lifetime of a machine, the investment costs represent only about 10 to 50 per cent of the overall costs.

After two excellent years, the business climate in the global textile industry became more moderate in 2012. It was also reflected in the order intake of the German textile machinery industry that was below the figures of 2011, but still on a satisfying level. German textile machinery exports reached 1.82 billion Euro in the first half of 2012 (minus 2.7 per cent year-on-year). Based upon weak fiscal conditions within the most important markets, the industry had to go through a difficult year.

Asia is the biggest market as it absorbed 40% of the German textile machinery exports. India is thesingle largest client in Asia in the last year. Between January and July 2012, German textile machinery worth 111 million Euros was shipped to India. The second popular for German textile machine is USA. The 10 largest export markets for German textile machines and accessories areIndia, China (including Hong Kong), Turkey, US,Italy, Czech Republic, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

German textile machinery is characterized by its high quality and customer-specific production. The trend setting players in the German Textile machinery industry have never stopped to explore new application fields which provide them with great opportunities.

Belgium focuses on its textile machinery industry:

The Belgian machinery industry, counting its textile machinery, is the best ever growing industrial sector measured by employment in Belgium. In the past 5 years ayearly growth rate of 4.5% was achieved in this sector, while its world market share rose with 10%. Avital driver for that performance was the doubling of investments in the machining industry over the 1998-2008periods. Since 2012, investments have picked up again and Belgian machinery companies are altering themselves to accelerate their product development rate and flexibility. Now the Belgian machinery industry is the nation’s 3th exporter.

Belgian machinery always focus of R&D, as 7% of added value of these industries has been endowed in R&D  and employs over 10% of the total Belgian research head count. The industry strongly accelerated its research efforts on energy efficiency.

The Belgian textile machinery industry counts 30 companies, has a turnover of 1 Billion euro and a headcount of 4000. Its companies are active in machinery for indoor textiles (carpet, upholstery, velvet,table – bed linen), garment textiles, technical textiles and textile finishing. Belgium produces the fastest air jet weaving machines in the world. The Belgian textile machinery companies pursue technological leadership strategies.

France emphasizes on waste recycling technologies:

It may be noted that the French textile machinery industry is a dynamic sector, play a particularly important role in the historical development of the textile industry. In particular, think about the illustrious name of Jacquard, the French inventor of the most sophisticated weaving technology. French has 35 textile machine manufacturing -companies, with a global turnover of 1.5 billion Euros, exports 91 per cent of their products to 115 customer countries.

The French industry strategy now is to differentiate standard from mass products, modernize equipment and technology, and to innovate and move to products with higher added value. The specific sectors covered are long fibre spinning machinery; textile waste recovery machines; systems for yarn treatment and production of technical textiles; nonwovens manufacturing lines; additional equipment for weaving (dobbies and jacquard heads); finishing machines for bleaching, dyeing, yarn finishing, finishing lines for knitted goods and textile hydro-extractors; and air-conditioning equipment for textile factories. In the new sectors of the textile industry like nonwoven processes, the French machinery is also at the pinpoint of innovation.

Recycling the textile materials at the end of their life cycle and transform them into new products, being environmentally friendly, is also an issue on which the French machinery manufacturers are among world leaders.

Turkey moving well with both textile goods and machinery manufacturing:

Textile is one of the key sectors in the Turkish economy in terms of GDP, employment and export. Textile accounts for 10 % of the Turkish GDP and 20% of employment in manufacturing sector. The value of textiles and clothing industry production is around US$ 30 billion and exported US$ 19,3 billion worth of textile and clothing per year.  With this amount, it had a share of 19 % in total exports of Turkey The strong textile industry in Turkey kicked off the expansion of the textile machinery industry. Until 1980 nearly all textile machinery was imported. However, starting in 1980 some local production of small and medium sized low-tech machinery began. At present, the line of products manufactured by the companies varies substantially from highly automated equipment to basic models, and local producers are able  to  compete  with  foreign  companies  in  most  machinery  categories,  such  as atmospheric jet dyeing (overflow) or blow dyeing machinery.

Textile machinery exports have an upward trend between 2002 and 2008. Turkish textile machinery exports were US$ 271 million in 2008, and decreased to US$ 263 million in 2009 with a share of 3.2 % in total machinery exports. During 2010 the export market was a growth of 266 million dollars. At present, the Turkish textile machinery industry is the most modern in the Middle East, North Africa, Balkans, Baltic and Central Asia and produces machinery and equipment required for the textile industry and all parts and accessories. The sector exports are directed to about 135 countries and major export markets in order of rank are Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Uzbekistan and Bangladesh, almost all textile manufacturing countries. High engineering skills, product flexibility, continuous product development and adaptation, and efficient after sales services enable Turkey to export Turkish made textile machinery all over the world at anrising rate.

Bangladeshi import is going down!

As per recent Bangladesh Bank data import of capital machinery fell drastically by 26 per cent during the July-April period of the current fiscal year from the same period last year due to slow growth of both local and foreign investments. BB data shows LCs opening for import of capital machinery was only $ 1.797 billion during the first ten months of the current fiscal year compared to $ 2.421 billion during corresponding period of last year. Textile industry is the number one manufacturing industry of the country hence the lion share of the above mentioned capital machinery would be for this industry. But due to unavailability of data it could not summed up that textile & RMG industry capital machinery import has reduced or not. But it is definitely the trend that Bangladesh is suffering lack of machinery investment as a whole in this fiscal year which can be a result of banking sector, gas electricity & political turbulences going through the year. But we have seen in February issue cover story that before this fiscal year Bangladesh was having a robust growth in textile machinery import through the years 2006 to 2011 and before that from 2000 to 2005 textile machinery import growth was drastically increasing year on year.

Textile machinery manufacturing is an essential sector for the production chain. The range of textile machinery used in the sector is, therefore, large. More than 80 tariff lines cover the international trade of textile machinery and spare parts which are used directly in manufacturing of textiles and clothing products. Investment in this sector needs to be encouraged to decrease dependence on imports and ultimately lead to export of not only textiles and clothing products but machinery and spares parts as well.Price, flexibility and versatility comprise the determining factors for new equipment purchases. As such, the market is witnessing emergence of more efficient machines, at competitive prices, thanks to rapid technological advances in the textile machinery industry. End-users are increasingly seeking complete automation solutions with enhanced flexibility that can be availed at reasonable costs.