Sentinel Capital Partners Acquires Specialty Engineered Materials Manufacturer Nekoosa

NEW YORK CITY — November 2, 2017 — Sentinel Capital Partners, a private equity firm that invests in promising companies at the lower end of the middle market, today announced the acquisition of Nekoosa, a leading manufacturer of specialty paper and film products used in the graphics and commercial print markets. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Nekoosa, Wis., Nekoosa produces a comprehensive suite of specialty engineered materials in four key product areas: application and pressure sensitive tapes used to protect and transfer graphics onto surfaces such as store windows and commercial vehicles; specialty synthetic papers that offer a digitally printable tear-and-water-proof alternative to lamination; sheeted digital and offset grade carbonless paper; and extruded film products used in wall panel, credit card, and lighting applications. Through a network of more than 1,000 global distributor partners, Nekoosa serves a highly-diverse base of more than 70,000 commercial print and graphics shops in 65 countries.

“Nekoosa gives Sentinel an opportunity to partner with a differentiated industry leader that draws on a unique, niche product offering that is considered the ‘gold standard’ in its markets,” said Scott Perry, a partner at Sentinel. “Nekoosa has enhanced its leadership position through its highly-specialized operational expertise, unparalleled distribution network, and excellent corporate culture committed to developing a first-class employee base. We are thrilled to partner with Nekoosa’s highly talented and committed management team.”

“Nekoosa has a long, successful track record of innovation, leadership, and growth driven by dedicated employees,” said Paul Charapata, CEO, Nekoosa. “In the last five years, we have successfully executed four add-on acquisitions and have developed a playbook for the identification and integration of complementary businesses. We look forward to working closely with our new partners at Sentinel to continue this positive trajectory.”

The past 12 months have been highly productive for Sentinel. Besides acquiring Nekoosa, Sentinel made four other platform investments — Altima Dental, the largest dental services organization in Canada; Cabi, a leading direct marketer of women’s fashion apparel; MB2 Dental Solutions, a rapidly-growing dental service organization with a unique physician-centric ownership model; and SONNY’S Enterprises, the worldwide leader in conveyorized car wash systems. During this same period, Sentinel sold Checkers & Rally’s Restaurants, an iconic and innovative drive-thru restaurant chain; National Spine & Pain Centers, a leader in interventional pain management; Playcore, a North American designer, manufacturer, and marketer of a broad range of play, park, and recreation products; Power Products, a leading global provider of branded electrical products and systems; and WellSpring Consumer Healthcare, a portfolio of high-performing OTC healthcare brands.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: Sentinel Capital Partners

VDMA: Regina Brückner New Chairperson of the German Textile Machinery Association

BERLIN/FRANKFURT, Germany — November 2, 2017 — Regina Brückner, managing associate, Brückner Trockentechnik, is the new chairperson of the VDMA Textile Machinery Association. The businesswoman from Leonberg was elected at the members’ meeting of the Association in Berlin. The new executive board is completed with Verena Thies, Thies Textilmaschinen, and Fritz P. Mayer, Karl Mayer Textilmaschinenfabrik, who were elected as vice chairpersons.

After her election, Regina Brückner stated: “I am pleased to have Ms. Thies and Mr. Mayer by my side, the two chairpersons who complement each other very well. Mr. Mayer is an entrepreneurial personality with decades of experience which he is meanwhile bringing in as the president of CEMATEX, the European Committee of Textile Machinery Manufacturers.  Ms. Thies assumed responsibility in the family company early on and has been working for the traditional company Thies in international textile machinery business since 2009.”

The new executive board for the legislative period until 2021 is composed of:

  • Regina Brückner, chairperson, Brückner Trockentechnik;
  • Verena Thies, vice chairperson, Thies;
  • Fritz P. Mayer, vice chairman, Karl Mayer Textilmaschinenfabrik;
  • Johann Phillip Dilo, Oskar Dilo Maschinenfabrik;
  • Peter D. Dornier, Lindauer Dornier;
  • Arno Gärtner, Karl Mayer Textilmaschinenfabrik;
  • Roland Hampel, A. Monforts Textilmaschinen;
  • Dr. Janpeter Horn, Herzog;
  • Markus Kleindorp, Memminger-Iro;
  • Martin Küppers, Saurer Schlafhorst;
  • Georg Stausberg, Oerlikon Textile;
  • Andreas Lukas, Andritz Küsters;
  • Benjamin Mayer, Mayer & Cie.;
  • Eric Schöller, Groz-Beckert; and
  • Heinrich Trützschler, Trützschler.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: VDMA

Gerber Technology Partners With Avametric To Unlock The Reality Of 3-D

TOLLAND, Conn. — November 2, 2017 — 3-D technology promises vast efficiency gains in the design process and consumer shopping experience. Today, 3-D technology is complex to implement and use. Additionally there is a wide gap between 3-D design and the actual manufactured product. The fashion industry spends billions of dollars annually on physical samples which slows down development and has a negative environmental impact. The majority of these samples could be produced digitally and Gerber Technology has made consistent investments to advance its AccuMark 3D to help customers address this core challenge. And today at their ideation conference, Gerber unveil its advances and announce a major partnership with Avametric that position the company to leap forward and create a whole new dimension in fashion. Gerber Technology and Avametric, a producer of fabric simulation and 3-D consumer applications, are combining forces to offer the first end to end 3-D platform, from consumer facing virtual try-on applications to design, development and manufacturing. The joint 3-D platform will provide highly realistic 3-D simulations that can be used from consumer side visualization all the way through production.

Avametric’s team is made up of experts from the technology, academic, retail and special effects industry, including two academy award winners and six Ph.D.’s. Their advanced in simulation, combined with AccuMark’s fully integrated 2-D and 3-D applications makes it the easiest to use 3D product on the market and at the same time most sophisticated 3-D simulation engine. Users will be able to move from 2-D patterns to 3-D digital samples that are production ready, which can result in a savings of up to 50 percent in time and cost.

“You may hear and see many other 3-D products on the market” said Karsten Newbury senior vice president and general manager. “We hear from our customers that most of them are not actually using our competitors’ 3-D products because they find them too difficult to use and don’t integrate well with a 2-D workflow.”

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Gerber,” said Ari Bloom, Avametric’s CEO. “As we explored our partnership options, we technically evaluated many of the top design and development products on the market. Ultimately we came to the conclusion that Gerber’s strategy and focus on 3-D was based on accurate pattern data and on usability, and we believe this is the key to a scalability of applications that meet the core needs of the fashion industry.”

The two partners also have a shared long-term road-map of providing 3-D solutions that span the entire fashion development value chain. While Gerber has solutions focused on the design, sampling and manufacturing side of the value chain, Avametric already has consumer facing virtual try-on applications that have drawn interest from some of the world’s leading fashion brands. Combined, they are the only provider of an integrated end-to-end 3-D platform, and one that easily integrates with Gerber’s AccuMark 2D product.

Both company’s customers will benefit from the combination of skills and industry knowledge created by this partnership. The first commercially available application will be with the release of AccuMark V11.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: Gerber Technology

Textile Industry Praises Trump China NME Decision, Urges Aggressive Trade Enforcement

WASHINGTON — November 2, 2017 — With President Donald Trump headed to Asia this November 3-14 to visit Japan, South Korea, China, Vietnam and the Philippines, the National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) praised the Trump administration’s recent determination reaffirming China’s non-market economy status for antidumping purposes and called for even more aggressive U.S. enforcement to crack down on unfair trade practices.

“The evidence could support no other decision,” said NCTO President and CEO Auggie Tantillo, as NCTO concurred with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s exhaustively researched determination that China is still a non-market economy.

Tantillo added, “Properly defining China as a non-market economy simply confirms what every U.S. manufacturer already understands — China has a set of unfair and extraordinary advantages that allow them to displace investment, production and employment in our market.

“We encourage President Trump to use his trip to Asia to reaffirm his commitment to enforcing America’s trade laws fairly, but resolutely,” Tantillo continued, pointing to public comments filed by NCTO suggesting additional reasonable activities the U.S. government could undertake to improve trade enforcement, thereby creating more good jobs.

NCTO is a Washington, DC-based trade association that represents domestic textile manufacturers.

  • U.S. employment in the textile supply chain was 565,000 in 2016.
  • The value of shipments for U.S. textiles and apparel was $74.4 billion last year, a nearly 11% increase since 2009.
  • U.S. exports of fiber, textiles and apparel were $26.3 billion in 2016.
  • Capital expenditures for textile and apparel production totaled $2 billion in 2015, the last year for which data is available.
  • NCTO is also a member of Manufacturers for Trade Enforcement, a multi-industry coalition supporting the continued designation of China as a non-market economy.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO)

Clive Wilkie Joins Downlite As VP Quality Assurance And Compliance

MASON, Ohio — November 2, 2017 — In its ongoing effort to ensure continued leadership in international quality assurance, product integrity, and quality compliance, Downlite has appointed Clive Wilkie vice president, Quality Assurance & Compliance effective immediately.

With more than 40 years of experience, Wilkie has extensive knowledge across all aspects of quality assurance and compliance, most recently with Pacific Coast Feather.

“Customer quality chain requirements from each of the divisions we proudly serve — home, hospitality and outdoor — are ever evolving and becoming more sophisticated,” said Josh Werthaiser, Downlite CEO.  “As a result, suppliers are placing unrelenting focus on building proactive processes and installing key performance indicators throughout our supply chain. Clive is best-in-class in these areas and his skill set perfectly aligns with Downlite’s quality legacy and strategic approach.”

Wilkie will report to Frank Carella, vice president, Operations, and be based in Downlite’s Mason, Ohio, headquarters. He replaces Chuck Northcutt former Downlite vice president, Quality Assurance.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: Downlite

EDANA Launches Call For Papers For The International Nonwovens Symposium

BRUSSELS — November 2, 2017 — EDANA has opened the call for papers for the 2018 International Nonwovens Symposium, to be held in Rome from May 23-24, 2018.

Organized on behalf of the nonwovens industry in general, the symposium will feature a mix of topics on nonwovens across all types of applications and address the innovative technologies, products and uses of nonwoven materials or products as well as the essential role of raw materials.

The conference will focus on the following topics:

  • Sustainability, including recycling and the circular economy;
  • Nonwoven industry trends;
  • Product, process & material innovation;
  • Hygiene & personal care wipes markets; and
  • Industrial, technical & automotive nonwovens.

Table top exhibition space will also be offered to enable companies to establish new business contacts, promote their brand to a global audience, launch and demonstrate innovative technologies, products and services.

Persons interested in a speaking role are invited to send their abstract to helene.colbach@edana.org by January 15, 2018.

Posted November 2, 2017

Source: EDANA

Savio Macchine Tessili To Exhibit At ShanghaiTex 2017,  Hall E1 Stand B11

PORDENONE, Italy — November 1, 2017 — Savio will exhibit in Shanghai the Polar Evolution winding machine: a high performance, energy saving and less labor-intensive product for the Chinese customers.
 Polar winding machines have been recently developed to the Evolution series, gathering all the innovative solutions in terms of technology, efficiency, quality output and maintenance. A further step for Polar family to catch the world of I.T. connectivity and the new fibers applications.

The machine on display will be a freestanding fully automated one, provided with new features to process bobbins produced by ring frames not equipped with automatic doffing device. “Premium” winder is a solution for processing yarn bobbins whose formation is not originally “favorable” to reach efficiency, for example bobbins with tangles, entanglements and misplaced yarns tail. The newly designed hopper “Pace Sorter Feeder” will optimize the bobbing feeding for a fast and smooth bobbin flow.
 In addition, special solutions have been engineered for automatic devices (bobbin preparation, transport, etc.) present in the fully automatic winder models to control and process springy elastic yarns. A special “Lycra kit” is available for yarn end finder station of fully automatic winding machines, in order to grant the highest efficiency for the bobbin preparation in presence of single or dual core yarns.

New Evo drums for improving package-unwinding performance

In downstream processing, the unwinding behavior of the package and the take-up speed facilitate process to be more efficient and geared to benefit.
 Savio has now a full range of grooved drums to cover all yarn types, counts and downstream processes. The EVO drums offer new capabilities to optimize both the unwinding speed of the packages and the package yarn content, through variable number of turns with different winding angles. The package shape is optimized in order to obtain advantages for a better unwinding ratio in the downstream process, for homogeneous package density and for lower rewinding breaks.

Upgraded Splicing Solutions

The Polar Evolution winding unit is equipped with splicing and tension control devices for ensuring perfect joints and perfect package shape. Air and Moistair® splicers boasts a Duo Air Feeding system, for yarn tail preparation and splicing. This splitting allows the individual setting of the most appropriate value of air pressure, and makes these splicers able to easily process any different fibers and blends combination.

Savio Winder 4.0 – Smart Industry Solutions for Textile Mills

Once composed solely by mechanical and electrical parts, now winding machines have become complex systems that combine hardware, sensors, data storage, microprocessors, software and connectivity. These smart machineries can increase the efficiency of the spinning mill and perform predictive maintenance avoiding breakdowns and downtimes. Savio winding machines can be equipped upon request of Smart Industry Solutions for connectivity, data management, remote machine set up and operator real-time interactivity. Savio Winder 4.0 represents an important step towards a wide digitalization process, being a solution for intelligent networking of machines in the spinning/winding room. This data management system is a very modern and important management tool, relieving mill management staff of time-consuming routine work. The mill manager can have the winding room live monitoring directly from his/her desk. Thanks to data analytics, a wealth of data are available, allowing to manage the different production phases in the best possible way and to monitor all significant parameters anytime and anywhere, making use of mobile devices. All these features enable Savio customers to control overall equipment effectiveness, increase workforce efficiency, and maximize quality and working time.

Posted November 1, 2017

Source: Savio

White Oak Commercial Finance Provides $15MM Factoring Facility To Leading Apparel Manufacturer And Distributor, Mias Fashion

NEW YORK CITY — November 1, 2017 — White Oak Commercial Finance LLC (WOCF) announced today that it has provided a $15 million factoring facility to Mias Fashion, an innovative leader in the full package apparel manufacturing and global sourcing.

Since 1999, Mias Fashion has efficiently produced high-quality products for many of the nation’s leading brands and retailers. The company is headquartered in Santa Fe Springs, Calif., with global operations in South Korea, Mexico and Vietnam. The $15 million line of credit secured against accounts receivable and inventory will be used to facilitate growth and provide additional access to working capital. WOCF is the sole lender.

Peter Ahn, president and CEO of Mias Fashion said: “During the tough retail market condition, WOCF stepped above the rest with an innovative funding structure. With the facility provided by WOCF, Mias Fashion is able to entertain new opportunities to expand our business.”

“As innovative companies require more creative financing solutions beyond what traditional banks are able to offer, they are increasingly turning to WOCF for their borrowing needs,” said Robert Grbic, president and CEO, WOCF.

“For decades our California office has provided access to financing to wholesalers, manufacturers and importers serving the retail sector. Deals like this are a testament to our seasoned team, our ability to identify value in companies, and our innovative products that adapt to market conditions,” said Grbic.

Posted November 1, 2017

Source: White Oak Commercial Finance

Gerber Technology To Support AxF, X-Rite’s Appearance Exchange Format

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — November 1, 2017 — At ideation 2017 in Los Angeles, X-Rite Inc. and its subsidiary Pantone LLC, today announced that Gerber Technology’s YuniquePLM® and AccuMark® will natively support the Appearance Exchange Format (AxF™) in 2018. Developed by X-Rite, AxF is a vendor-neutral format that enables the communication of all aspects of a physical material’s appearance — color, texture, gloss, refraction, transparency, special effects (sparkles) and reflection properties —  in a single, editable file to improve design virtualization. Using AxF, fashion, apparel, and retail companies will be able to incorporate physically correct, virtual materials in YuniquePLM and AccuMark to create photorealistic 3-D images of garment samples in order to accelerate the design, creation and merchandising process.

AxF is the foundational component of the X-Rite Total Appearance Capture (TAC™) ecosystem, a solution that brings a new level of accuracy and efficiency to the capture, communication and presentation of physical materials in the virtual world. Traditionally, the capture and rendering of complex materials such as meshes and synthetic fabrics have been a time-consuming and manual process. TAC addresses this challenge with a new level of precision and quality in material scanning coupled with an ability to share the resulting data, via AxF, across an expanding set of virtual design and product lifecycle management (PLM) tools like YuniquePLM.

“Today YuniquePLM already supports Pantone libraries and we are excited to extend that relationship to our award-winning TAC ecosystem and AxF format,” said Dr. Francis Lamy, executive vice president and Chief Technology Officer, X-Rite and Pantone. “AxF will allow Gerber Technology customers to create physically accurate digital material libraries for a collection and virtually see a material’s texture, gloss or sheen in a 3-D model to understand how a material drapes and looks under various lighting conditions. This superior virtual experience will help reduce the need for physical samples, streamline design approval cycles, and allow apparel companies to respond quickly to changing consumer trends.”

“We are excited to have this integration with X-Rite as it furthers our mission to help our customers decrease time to market by understanding textile properties prior to creating physical samples,” said Karsten Newbury, senior vice president and general manager, Software Solutions Group.

YuniquePLM is a product lifecycle management tool specially developed for the apparel and retail industries. It enables businesses to connect their creative teams with their supply chain, and get the right products to the market on time and at the right cost. AccuMark pattern design software allows apparel brands to design, develop and market their products as quickly and efficiently as possible. Together these systems help accelerate time to market, reduce lead time and improve margins by managing the details of line plans, tech packs and samples, and simplifying communication and collaboration with global partners.

TAC Captures Physical Material Appearance

The TAC ecosystem is comprised of the TAC7 scanner, PANTORA™ Material Hub desktop application, and Virtual Light Booth (VLB). Physical material samples are scanned using the TAC7 scanner, which captures appearance properties digitally to create AxF files that store appearance data. The files are stored, managed, viewed and edited in the PANTORA desktop application. The AxF files can be shared with Product Lifecycle Management (PLM), Computer-Aided Design (CAD), and state-of-the art rendering applications including Allegorithmic Substance Designer; AMD Radeon™ ProRender; Autodesk VRED™ Professional 2017; Gerber Technology YuniquePLM and AccuMark; Lumiscaphe Patchwork 3D; Luxion KeyShot® Next Limit Maxwell; and NVIDIA Iray®.

The Virtual Light Booth is the industry’s first immersive 3-D visualization environment for evaluating material appearance. It allows users to accurately and efficiently visualize and compare 3-D digital material renderings side-by-side with physical samples. The VLB combines X-Rite’s SpectraLight QC professional light booth technology with a high-brightness, color-calibrated, LCD display; color management technology; and motion tracking sensors. This allows the VLB viewing environment to control parameters that influence the perception of appearance from illumination to contextual to observational factors. With the VLB, design teams can easily verify these conditions to see changes in material performance. This helps ensure consistency between digital prototypes and final physical products and empowers designers to make more informed material selection decisions reducing approval cycles and accelerating time to market.

X-Rite is demonstrating the TAC ecosystem this week at ideation. Attendees will see how AxF files can be used within the YuniquePLM and AccuMark software and applied to rendering and 3-D design.

Posted November 1, 2017

Source: X-Rite

TVF Completes Integration Of Pacific Coast Fabrics Acquisition

CARMEL, Ind. — November 1, 2017 — Top Value Fabrics announced today it has completed the integration for the acquisition of Pacific Coast Fabrics. The acquisition expands the company’s product offerings and strengthens its West Coast distribution network for printable textiles.

“Our transition to become one company is complete,” explains Chris Fredericks, president, Top Value Fabrics. “Since our announcement in June, we’ve received tremendous support from both customers and industry partners. On behalf of our team, I want to thank everyone who has helped to make this a smooth transition.”

The newest members of the TVF team have moved a few miles down the road to TVF’s Carson, Calif., office.

Mike Sanders has transitioned to his new role with TVF as director of Printable Textiles and Finishing Technology. Sanders stated: “This incredible growth with our longtime friends at TVF allows us to offer remarkable new opportunities to the markets we serve. As part of this progress, we have recently unveiled a new showroom at our Carson office which provides a significant space to hold training sessions, view fabric samples and showcase fabric applications.”

Robert Hinsch, vice president, Top Value Fabrics, added: “It’s a milestone for the company and has already proved to be invaluable to have both offices merged into our newly remodeled Carson location. As part of TVF’s evolution through this integration, we’re committed to making it even easier to do business with us. We’ve nearly doubled the warehouse space in our West Coast Distribution Center. This move accommodates new printable fabrics in the Apparel, Print Media and Home Furnishings markets and provides added stock items and convenience for customers. We’ve also increased slitting capabilities across the company in response to customer demand.”

As the transition is complete, the now-larger TVF has welcomed its new team members and customers alike. “It’s an exciting time and we’re thrilled to deliver an expanded selection of quality, printable textiles with the same fast, friendly service for which we’re known,” said Fredericks. “I’m confident of a continued positive outlook for our team and customers in this growing industry we’re proud to serve.”

Posted November 1, 2017

Source: Top Value Fabrics

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