India will always be a promising market for us

Mayer & Cie. is one of the leading companies in circular knitting machinery market, which has reached a volume of around 300,000 machines over the past 10 years. The company is also one of the leading suppliers in braiding machines producing reinforcements for high-pressure hoses.

Timo Schramm, Regional Sales Manager at Mayer & Cie., speaks on India as a potential market for German machinery industry in the next few years.

Excerpts…

What are some of the emerging trends in textile machinery industry globally?
Trends in the industry are pretty much the ones we’ve seen in the recent past. Generally speaking, there is productivity and sustainability. That’s the benchmark for all our machines. Automation and digitisation also are recurring topics in the industry.

Talking about trends in applications, there is sportswear with a strong desire for pattern variety. This is where body-mapping and mesh comes in. Circularly knitted shoe uppers have been discussed several times already. Spacer fabrics, a prerequisite for shoe uppers, has become popular in underwear and outerwear, too. And mattress ticking is developing positively again.

What are the various products on offer for the textile industry? What are its USPs?
The Mayer & Cie. portfolio is known to be the most comprehensive in the industry. We provide all types of circular knitting machines needed to produce modern day textiles, from underwear, sportswear and outerwear to home textiles, seat covers and technical textiles.

We are quite famous for our Relanit machines based on our proprietary relative technology. The latest addition to this product family is the Relanit 3.2 HS. Processing cotton, it reaches up to 50 rpm in a 30-inch frame. It also features extraordinary reliability and productivity when working with elastomeric yarns. A further popular Relanit model is the Relanit 4.0; it features 120 feeders at 30-inch.

Another one of our focus areas is mattress ticking. We have specially tailored machines to fit this industry sector’s particular requirements. Pattern variety, ease of use and productivity are the key factors. The fully electronic circular knitting machines in Mayer & Cie.’s OVJA range deliver precisely these benefits. The latest model is the OVJA 2.4 EM. It is the most productive mattress-ticking machine producing up to 30 kg of fabric per hour. Another machine we should mention is the OVJA 1.6 EE, a machine featuring double electronics for superb quality.

Let’s also have a look at our double jersey top sellers, mainly for interlock. Our most productive machine in this realm is the D4 2.2 HPI. The D4 3.2 is apt to knit interlock, too, but also works towards 8-lock structures, punto di roma, piqué, scuba (spacer) and finer gauges.

Lately, we have also put particular emphasis on our digital solutions. At ITMA 2019, we unveiled knitlink. A Web shop for spare parts and a new digital service approach are both based on knitlink. In the in future, our customers will be able to record and analyse the production data of their Mayer circular knitting machines.

What are your views on India as a potential market for German machinery industry in the next few years?
India will always be an interesting and promising market for us. The market itself is growing constantly. India has one of the largest populations worldwide and sportswear and casual wear is becoming ever more popular. That means you need fabrics produced on circular knitting machines whose number is consequently on the rise in India. At the same time, there is a very profound and long-term knowledge in textile production leading to high-quality products. Taken together, that makes India one of the major exporters of ready-made clothing.

Mayer & Cie. has been in India for well over three decades, and since 1984 we have been working with Batliboi, a trusted and reliable player in textile Machinery field. We’ve got a three-decade-old strong relationship. With over 9000 Mayer and Cie. machines operating across the country, India becomes one of the most important global markets for the company.

How flexible are the German companies to adapt to changes in the textile industry?
We know our own company best, so let’s focus on Mayer & Cie.: As mentioned above, we have a very extensive portfolio of machines of about 50 different types which we tailor to our customers special requests. So there is a lot of flexibility already there.

At the same time, we regularly come up with new technologies. That’s part of our self-concept. We invest an above average budget in research and development to be able to go ahead in the market and cater for trends. At ITMA 2019, we presented our new MJ 3.2 E, which is targeted at producing sportswear. With its 3-in-1 concept, the machine also features pattern variety and productivity. The OVJA 1.1 EETT, also presented at ITMA, is a premium machine for premium results in show uppers.

How has been the going for your company during 2019-2020 in terms of performance? What are the pluses and minuses in the prospects for 2020 globally?
The years 2018 and 2019 had been demanding years for textile machinery manufacturers. The reasons are well known: The trade war between China and the US as well as several local conflicts were fueling insecurity and reluctance to invest in new machinery. Beginning of 2020 was very promising again and even in March, when Covid-19 was starting to hold Europe in its tight grip we benefited from an increasing interest in short supply chains. Yet, with the beginning of the lockdown, incoming orders came to a halt. We are now seeing what seems like a recovery. We have already reached a steady order intake again, yet at a lower level still than at the beginning of the year.

Talking about prospects is very hard these days. We all hope there won’t be a second wave of Covid-19 so that we can focus on reinvigorating the industry.

Since most the exhibitions are cancelled due to Covid, what are the new strategies your company may be exploring to boost their investment and collaborations in India in the near future?
With travelling bans intact, we have focused on web-meetings with existing and potential clients in India. Although this can’t fully replace face-to-face contact, we have found it a viable option to keep in touch along with our strong Indian partner Batliboi who are well positioned to support customers across India. In the future, we are planning to present some of our latest technologies via this form of communication.

In October this year, we’ll participate in a two-week virtual trade fair, Innovate – Textile + Apparel Virtual Trade Show. We were one of the early exhibitors to have signed up; with all the positive experiences in digital communications, we expect this to be a good platform to present our portfolio to a wider audience – and to catch up with everyone.

What kind of challenges are you anticipating post-Covid?
Apart from the trends we have seen before the pandemic—fight climate change, increasing productivity while lowering resource deployment—we will have to work very hard to get back to the world economy’s pre-Corona levels. That means solving general problems, like travelling being widely impossible, as well as tackling with local challenges.

Were there any special efforts mounted in recent times to boost German machinery industry’s presence in India? What were the results?
Apart from the above-mentioned web-meetings and signing-up for a virtual trade fair, we participated in an Indo-German exchange organised by the VDMA’s textile machinery section. This online event was held at the end of April this year. The VDMA India had done a flash survey among its members on impacts of Covid-19. The results that were presented during the web-meeting gave us, the German textile machinery builders, a better insight and helped participants to better understand and address the situation in India.