Scope to grow

Import of textiles industry spare parts has been continuously rising from China and trend will be continued this year as well, say industry experts.

Newer opportunities are knocking at the doors of textile engineering industry in terms of growing demand of textile machinery in the domestic market and also exports to the neighbouring countries. The components and accessories sector is catering to the requirements of not only the leading Indian textile machinery manufacturers but also of almost all composite and decentralised units. The quality and design of spares and accessories installed over the textile machines play a vital role in the performance and sustainability of the machine.

As per the Textile Machinery Manufacturers’ Association (TMMA) data, the spares and accessories market was around Rs 1,205 crore in 2013-14, but now it has come down to around Rs 920 crore in 2017-18. The market is diminishing at the rate of 5 per cent year on year.

Import of textile machinery and accessories in 2018-2019 grew 24 per cent compared to the previous year, Jugal Kishore Pansari, President of Indian Textile Accessories and Machinery Manufacturers’ Association (ITAMMA), said. Total import of textile machinery and accessories last financial year was worth $1,165 million. The highest imports were of digital printing machinery ($430.20 million), accounting for 37 per cent of the total imports. Weaving machines worth $135.58 million and spinning machinery and accessories worth $96.12 million were imported last fiscal. Import of spinning products and machinery grew 41.85 per cent.

Consider a company like Mylon Metallics, a small but major player from Coimbatore, producing steaming/conditioning machines, packing systems and spares for the captioned machines. Says D Srinivasan, Director, Mylon Metallics: “There is a consolidation in the textile machinery business. Worldwide, the trade will be dominated by a few companies. We need to find niche markets. Customer focus would be the key to success.”

Speaking on the cheaper products that are hurting your industry, D Srinivasan said, “Cheaper alternatives are hurting the spinning industry to a great extent. Spares are flooding from China and other countries. Quality will only sustain. Government intervention is required to regulate the import of products.”

“Western countries are moving their manufacturing to Asia with lower costs. There is a good scope for the spares and accessories to grow in India. We should focus on making components at par with the global standards as the performance expectation is more from the customer. Gone are the days of look-alike spurious parts. We cannot expect the government for everything. We from Coimbatore grow on our own efforts rather than depending on the government,” said D Srinivasan.

E-age has spawned e-catalogues and e-spares, which have already made inroads. With the need for faster speed delivery and a variety of products from diverse points from a single source, a new wave has set in – third-party e-marketeers touting parts and accessories 7×24. Says Viren Mehta, CEO of BookMyParts.com: “There is no better time than now for online purchase of textiles spare parts in India. Countries like China, USA, and some part of Europe are already buying spare parts online. There are definite advantages of buying spare parts online. First of all, as you know, machine spare parts trade in India is highly chaotic and disordered which resulted into high cost, lack of transparency, lower productivity and inefficient supply chain.”

Added Mehta, “In the textile industry in India, there are many imported machines bought from China, Taiwan, Korea etc. since last several years, now several factories are facing issues of maintenance of machinery and procurement of spare parts. Many a times, spare parts are not available so there are production related problems, delay, sometime textile factories have to pay high cost for procurement of these parts have to be stocked because of its uncertain availability. There is no enough information available on how to procure imported textiles machine spare parts and so on.”

“Online procurement of machine spare parts is having a huge potential to grow so there is a definite growth prospects for online marketers. Conventional practices of business need to be replaced with online and modern technology, tools and new paradigms of online marketing and promotion,” said Mehta.

According to the TMMA data, the production of the textile engineering industry recorded a decrease of 1 per cent viz. Rs 6,865 crore in 2018-19 as against Rs 6,900 crore achieved during 2017-18. The decline in production of spinning machinery was responsible for this decrease. It is expected that spinning machinery sector might increase its production during 2019-20. In weaving sector particularly, the shuttleless loom category the growth rate was stagnant due to uncertain situation created by the unfavourable procedures under the ATUF scheme as well as adverse situation in the powerloom sector arisen because of the cash business. Synthetic filament yarn sector also recorded a marginal increase in production while the processing sector got a significant increase due to export. In fact, many of the processing machinery manufacturers did well during the first half of the fiscal gone by.

The export of textile machinery to the third world countries increased during the year. The Association made efforts in helping the TEI to increase its exports further during the year. On the basis of the data furnished by the Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence & Statistics (DGCI&S), Kolkata, the estimated export performance during 2018-19 rose to Rs 3,665 crore as against Rs 2,939 crore achieved during 2017-18.

The total domestic demand for textile machinery during 2018-19 was Rs 13,004 crore of which imported machinery constituted Rs 9,804 crore. Supplies from the domestic machinery industry amounted to Rs 3,200 crore, aggregating 25 per cent of the total demand. As per the Chart above, the bulk of the demand was met through imports. The total capacity remained stagnant at Rs 11,000 crore in 2018-19 over 2017-18 whereas the gap with capacity utilisation increased over these years.

Import of textiles industry spare parts has been continuously rising from China and trend will be continued this year as well. The government is keen to promote local manufacturing of textiles machinery, accessories and industrial machinery spare parts through foreign direct investment and joint venture. India has witnessed continuous increase in production of textile spare parts over the last decade. Countries like Bangladesh imports 70 per cent of their requirements of textile spare parts and Indian companies have excellent potential to export textile machinery spare parts in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Vietnam and African countries. Growing Bangladesh market and other South Asian countries holds excellent potential for spare parts for India machinery spare parts manufacturers.

Another one such company that is making good strides in the accessories segment is Ahmedabad-based Ideal Group of Companies. Ideal’s President, Laxmikant Rathi agreed that the accessories and parts manufacturers have undergone tremendous changes in the recent times. He says, “Apart from product upgradation, Ideal has undergone capacity increase. During the last two years, we have increased the production capacity by almost 100 per cent. We have added Japanese and American make injection moulding machines for better quality and higher production.”

Added Rathi: “There is no doubt on the scope and opportunities. Very few manufacturers can make the varieties we make (types and colours). This gives us an edge even over European manufacturers. Ideal is supplying our products to major OEMs from Europe and Asia.”

Rathi provided some suggestions for the betterment of the industry. He says, “Our suggestion to the industry is to make quality products and help in building “Made in India” brand. Let’s adapt to world-class systems and processes, maintain highest standards in ISO, 5S and Six Sigma.”