Klüber Lubrication maintained stable growth trend by acquiring new businesses

Klüber Lubrication offers expert tribological solutions by supplying high-performance specialty lubricants directly to customers in almost all branches of industry and regional markets. Their customers include producers of components, modules, machines and systems as well as companies using this equipment for their own production or processing activities. Hitendra Bharagava, CEO and Regional Management Board Member Asia Pacific, Klüber Lubrication, highlights the current trends and outlook of the Indian textile industry.

How was your performance in FY23? What were the key challenges in FY23? How did you manage to grow in spite of the challenges?

The industry in 2023, continued in a similar sluggish fashion as 2022. As we’re all aware the overall demand started declining from July 2022 onwards due to a plethora of factors including but not limited to the steep cotton prices, significantly low requirements from the export market powerhouses such as the United States and Europe, low consumption of yarns from our neighbouring countries and fluctuating power rates among others. At Klüber we decided to focus on our basics to provide value to the customer through our solutions to continue our path towards sustainable growth. Needless to say, we remained loyal to our customers throughout these tumultuous times and extended our full support since the majority of our esteemed customers value us as trusted partners amidst demanding situations.

We maintained a stable growth trend by acquiring new businesses through our core principles of delivering value to the customers and providing a healthy support system for their manufacturing activities/initiatives. With our continued efforts, we were able to attain new opportunities in the end markets, collaborating with OEMs for new developments, and initiating innovative services that Klüber has to offer.

What is your current assessment of India’s textile industry (and/or textile engineering industry)?

The Indian Textile Industry is one of the oldest and biggest sectors contributing significantly to the country’s economy by employing more than 45 million people nationwide. Even one of the oldest industries must embrace a digital, connectivity-fuelled transformation gaining new trends, new opportunities, and avenues. Due to huge domestic consumption and export demands, the industry will remain the focus for the future. The Indian Textile export contributed around 15 per cent of the earnings and the industry is worth upwards of 10 Lakh Crores with exports alone worth 3.5 Lakh Crores.

Overcoming massive odds, India continues to remain the second-largest cotton producer in the World. The challenges for the market are fulfilling the requirements of big brands in terms of capacity, cotton availability fluctuations, competition from the SEA countries, dependency on export, and technological up scaling among others. However, we are observing multiple exciting new growth opportunities in traditional cotton-related, synthetics, technical textiles, and medical textiles.
 
What is the global standing of the Indian textile industry (and/or textile engineering industry)? How can India become more competitive globally?
Globally Indian textile industry is in the second position after China. The Indian textile industry is one of the largest in the world, with a massive raw material and textile manufacturing base. The industry is divided into two major categories, the organised sector and the unorganised sector. The organised sector includes large-scale textile mills and garment manufacturers, while the unorganised sector includes small-scale cottage industries, khadi, village industries, power looms, handlooms, and hand-knitting. The sector manufactures a wide range of products, including cotton, polyester, and synthetic fabrics, yarns, threads, and garments. India is a global powerhouse in the textile industry, being the world’s largest cotton and jute producer. Cotton is the main raw material used in the production of textiles. Nearly 70 per cent of global jute production originates from India. The sector also has the second-largest production base for silk and fibres. Fibres produced in India can further be categorised into wool and man-made fibres. Cotton cultivation in India is mostly carried out in the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh. 
India is well-positioned to maintain its leadership in the textile industry with a robust industrial base that consists of a resilient supply chain extending from weaving to garment and processing coupled with an abundance of raw materials. To realise the true potential of the industry and create more employment opportunities for the Indian workforce, it is essential to tap into the elements and forces that have been fuelling its tremendous expansion.

Indian textile industry can become globally competitive by adopting and implementing the latest technologies, being reliable for global and big brand houses, quick availability and adaptability to new designs, and exporting more yarns and garments.

Are the government policies to boost the industry’s growth working on the ground? What else should the government do to propel growth?

The government is well aware of the magnitude of the textile industry in the national economic landscape and are doing their bit to support and promote the industry. They are doing so by launching a number of schemes, giving subsidies, and supporting local manufacturing. The PLI scheme to boost MMF manufacturing and scheme for integrated textile parks (SITP) are a few of note which come under the broad initiatives of “Skill India” and “Make in India”. Over and above these initiatives, a further boost could be from also providing full-fledged support to the export of cotton in order to sustain competitiveness in the global market
What kinds of trends are you seeing in the market at present? How is your company gearing up to tap these trends?

The latest observable trends are towards natural fabrics like cotton, linen, wool, silk, and cashmere. In 2022, one of the biggest textile industry trends was the increased demand for natural fibres and fabrics. Fibres like cotton grow rapidly and abundantly worldwide in places like China, India, and the United States. This quick growth of natural fibres acts as fuel powering the textile industry’s growth. Production rates of natural fibres are steadily increasing as demand grows, and this trend will most likely percolate into future years. Other trends are the use of non-woven fabrics, recyclable clothing, and more sustainable and digital activities.

What are your expectations & growth plans for FY24?

We aim to a growth in the high double digits while staying competitive. At the same time, our strategy would be to grow in new business areas and applications, work more closely with the global and local OEMs, be closer and faster to the markets in terms of new product introductions and make the right material available with our extensive manufacturing and logistic activities. Apart from the traditional business, we would like to focus on the synthetics, and technical textile markets and align our growth strategies accordingly.