MMF capacity needs to be raised by 5 times: Oerlikon meet

India’s share in global textile trade is hardly
6 per cent, while China’s share is over 38 per cent. We should triple our share, said Narendra Modi, India’s Prime Minister, and to achieve this, the country’s man-made fibre (MMF) capacity needs to be raised by five times,” said Debabrata Ghosh, General Manager – Sales, Oerlikon Textile India Pvt Ltd. Ghosh was inaugural speech along with an introduction by Juergen Vogel, Sales Director, Barmag at the Oerlikon 10th Year Manmade Fibers Customers Meet held in Daman.

About 48 per cent of China’s 38 per cent global share goes to the US, and this is under threat by the US-China row which is currently on. This share can be cornered
by India if the MMF industry diversifies into all high value-added products, said Ghosh. Talking of India’s failure to tap export properly, Ghosh said that while
Surat produces 4 million meters of PET fabric every day, not a single meter of these fabrics is exported out of
the country.

Who can predict what’s next? queried Andre Wissenberg, Vice President, Head of Marketing, Corporate Communications and Public Affairs, Oerlikon, who spoke on the challenges for the MMF industry in
a global environment. “Times have changed and been keeping on changing every time. Oerlikon has been bringing latest technologies to the customers in India, with whom the company has been maintaining good relationship. Oerlikon is about 100 years old, and
Barmag was established in 1922. By now, we have
been upgrading our technologies to meet the challenges of the industry.”

It is not only the world has changed, but also the people. Saying thus, Wissenberg went on to touch
upon the political changes in Europe, US and the
Asian countries. He spoke at length on the various contributions of Oerlikon to the industry including Industry 4.0 and the Smart Factory.

There were a series of presentations on the various technologies and machinery being offered by Oerlikon, particularly with emphasis on automation and Smart Factory. The presentations details are as follows:

• Marcel Bornheim (Vice President, Head of Customer Services) and Niklas Howe (Customer Services Oerlikon Neumag) — Partnering for Performance – Oerlikon Manmade Fibers Service Initiatives
• Sven Streiber (Regional Sales Manager Oerlikon Barmag) & Jeremy Liu (Marketing & Sales, Oerlikon Barmag Huitong Engineering (OBHE)) –Continuous Pol/condensation – Latest update on technology and product portfolio
• Volker Schmid (Sales Director AC-Automation GmbH
  & Co KG / member of Oerlikon Manmade Fibers Segment) — Innovative Solutions ‘From Melt to Truck’
• Martin Rademacher (Vice President, Head of Sales Oerlikon Neumag) & Henrik Radzanowski (Regional Sales Manager Staple Fiber Oerlikon Neumag) — Latest BCF and Polyester Staple Fiber Production Technologies
• Jochen Adler (Chief Technology Officer) & Arnulf Sauer (Head of Technology Management Take-up Systems) — From Melt to Yarn, Fibers and Nonwovens – Bring it to Life Guido Dresen (Regional Sales Manager) — state of the art in draw texturing Finally, the Q&A Session was moderated by Chetan Bhagat, Deputy General Manager Sales – Oerlikon Textile India Pvt Ltd, which was followed by the closing remarks and vote of thanks by Bhanu Patel, Managing Director – Oerlikon Textile India Pvt Ltd.