Japan-based Japan Wool Textile Co. Ltd. — a manufacturer of yarn and fabrics for uniforms and
related products, and men’s and women’s fashion textiles; and a division of Japan-based Nikke Group
— has introduced a new line of yarn, fabrics and apparel featuring Ultem* polyetherimide (PEI)
fiber from Pittsfield, Mass.-based SABIC Innovative Plastics — a global supplier of engineering
thermoplastics to a variety of markets including automotive, healthcare, transportation, and
building and construction.

Japan Wool Textile is blending Ultem with wool and other materials in the new products,
combining comfort and protection with Ultem’s inherent and permanent non-halogenated flame
retardance (FR) and ultraviolet resistance. Sabic reports that Ultem can be dyed to a large number
of shades using traditional polyester dyeing methods and creates a fabric that is soft and flexible
for improved comfort and wearability. In addition, Ultem meets several standards for heat
resistance including the U.S. National Fire and Protection Association 2112 and the European Union
EN 531/ISO 11612 standards; as well as performing with low smoke and low toxicity.

Shirts, pants, jackets and coveralls, as well as yarn and woven fabrics currently are
available.

“Following a rigorous development process, we launched a completely new flame-retardant
material by using Ultem fiber,” said Takanobu Matsumoto, general manager, Japan Wool Textile.
“Particularly in the areas of improved comfort and colorability, our new work wear products will
provide major benefits for customers and address unmet market needs.”

“This flexible, soft and colorable fiber provides superior comfort and aesthetics, plus
sustainable FR technology and the highest level of protection and durability for workers in
safety-focused industries such as oil and gas and chemicals,” said Kim Choate, global product
marketing manager, Sabic Innovative Plastics. “We foresee many other uses for this versatile fiber,
which has already broken new ground in composite aerospace boards for aviation interiors,
filtration media and other demanding applications.”

July 5, 2011

Englewood, Colo.-based Gevo Inc., a renewable chemicals and advanced biofuels company, reports that
it has collaborated with its potential customer Japan-based fiber, plastics and chemicals producer
Toray Industries Inc. to manufacture fully renewable and recyclable polyethylene terephthalate
(PET). Gevo manufactures isobutanol, and using prototypes of commercial petrochemical and refining
industry operations, it generated para-xylene from the isobutanol. The para-xylene was then
supplied to Toray, which converted the raw material into biobased PET products using its existing
technology and new technology developed in conjunction with Gevo. Moving forward, the companies
will work to go from lab-scale “proof-of-concept” production to commercial-scale production.

Early last year, the two companies signed a non-binding letter of interest for the future
supply of renewable para-xylene derived from Gevo’s isobutanol sometime in 2012 or later.

“We believe there is strong customer demand for fully renewable, non-petroleum derived PET
and we are working to fill that demand as soon as possible,” said Dr. Christopher Ryan, president
and COO, Gevo. “Last month, we disclosed that we had provided renewable para-xylene to
international brand owners for evaluation and the production of fully renewable bottle[s] from PET.
We are pleased to have validated this technology with Toray and look forward to building a market
for fully renewable PET as soon as possible.”

July 5, 2011

GREENSBORO, N.C. — June 30, 2011 — The County of Los Angeles will require retailers to distribute
reusable carry out bags or recyclable paper bags instead of single use plastic bags. The new
program goes into effect July 1, 2011 for supermarkets and large drugstores and January 1, 2012 for
food stores and pharmacies. To ensure that reusable textile bags are safe for long term consumer
use, L.A. County has approved the Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 as a third party certification of choice
to confirm that reusable textile bags do not contain harmful levels of heavy metal toxins such as
lead or cadmium. L.A. County requires the reusable bags to meet minimum construction and lifetime
performance measures as well so that they last for at least 125 uses.  

In addition to strictly limiting heavy metals in textiles, the Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 also
certifies that textiles have been tested for more than 100 other potentially hazardous substances
such as formaldehyde, phthalates, carcinogenic dyestuffs, and pesticides. Since the bags could be
used for carrying foodstuffs, L.A. County has recommended that they meet the heavy metal limits
specified in the two most stringent Oeko-Tex® certification classes, Class I or Class II, which
apply to textile products intended for close human contact. 

“Not only will Oeko-Tex® certified reusable textile shopping bags be safer for shoppers, they
will ultimately be better for the environment, too,” says Dr. Sam Moore who represents Oeko-Tex® in
North America. “Obtaining Oeko-Tex® certification essentially rules out the use of hazardous
processing chemicals that could leave residues on finished textiles. So the textiles are produced
in a more environmentally-friendly way and, at the end of their useful life, contain no chemicals
that can endanger the environment when they are finally discarded.” 

For more about Oeko-Tex® global textile certifications, visit
www.Oeko-Tex.com. Additional information about L.A. County’s
reusable bag program can be found at
http://dpw.lacounty.gov/epd/AboutTheBag.

Posted on July 5, 2011

Source: Oeko-Tex

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. — June 29, 2011 — The AATCC Foundation awards thousands of dollars in
grants and prizes each year. Congratulate the Color Solutions International scholar, the Gavin
Family Scholarship recipient, and the seven Metro Scholarship winners!

Amanda Grisham, from Oregon State University, was awarded the
2011 Color Solutions International Textile & Apparel Design Scholarship. Grisham
recently completed her junior year as an Apparel Design & Merchandise Management major. She is
also pursuing a minor in Business & Entrepreneurship. Grisham says her career goal is to
“create garments that are functional, practical, and beautiful.” Advisor Brigitte Cluver says
Grisham has already sought out “opportunities to better prepare herself for her future
career”-including joining AATCC as a student and attending a regional meeting of the Association.
The US$2,500
Color Solutions International scholarship is awarded annually to a student studying
textile or apparel design.

Rachel Anderson, North Carolina State University, was awarded the US$5,000
Charles E. Gavin III Family Scholarship. The Gavin Scholarship is available for eligible
rising freshmen, sophomores, juniors, or seniors at Auburn University, Clemson University, the
Georgia Institute of Technology, North Carolina State University, or the University of Georgia. (It is the desire and hope of the Gavin Family that those students who are chosen to receive
this scholarship will, someday, consider passing this opportunity on to another deserving
student.) Anderson is studying Textile Engineering with a minor in Industrial and Systems
Engineering. Though she started as a Computer Engineering student, Anderson realized that she “was
more interested in using computers than making them.” She says, “I have since realized how broad of
a field Textiles is, and I have found a specific niche within the Textile Engineering discipline
that feels almost as if it was created for me.” Anderson hopes to use her skills to model and
optimize outsourcing and response to fluctuations in demand within the textile industry. Professor
Melissa Pasquinelli praises Anderson’s work ethic and intellect. “The types of questions that she
asks both during and outside of class indicated that she not only comprehended the information, but
that she was applying, analyzing, and synthesizing the material. 

The
AATCC Foundation Metro Scholarship is an annual scholarship offered to sophomores and
juniors in New England, New York, and New Jersey attending universities with student chapters of
AATCC. The scholarship can be divided among several student recipients, with a minimum award of
US$1,000 each. 

The 2011 winners of the Metro Scholarship were:

Elizabeth Hogan, University of Rhode Island, considers the Textile Marketing
program a great opportunity to pursue her interests in marketing without being a full-time business
student. She also plans to complete a minor in Art.

Jill Austin, University of Rhode Island, is studying Textile Merchandising and
Design, with a minor in Art History. She says she is obtaining fundamental business skills and
studying “all aspects of fashion,” but designing clothes has been her passion since she was 10
years old. Austin plans to attend graduate school after completing her degree and hopes someday to
show a collection at New York’s fashion week.

Dana deBoer, University of Rhode Island, is pursuing a BS in Textiles, Marketing
& Design. Her minor is in Fine Art. DeBoer created her own fashion magazine and currently
interns for a fashion blog. She hopes to pursue a career with a major fashion publication.

Elina Franco, University of Rhode Island, plans to translate her major in Fashion
Merchandising and minor in Business into a career as a buyer for a major retailer. She says, “No
matter what, I know I will be successful in my career because when I want to achieve something, I
do not give up.” 



Sara E. Hughes, a University of Rhode Island Textile Merchandising and Design major,
says that “as long as I can remember, fashion has had a huge impact on my life.” Hughes wants to
“spend the rest of my life doing what I love and enjoying the world of fashion.”



Sania Josiah, a Textile Merchandising and Design major at the University of Rhode
Island, is eager to share her creativity. She explains that fashion is three-dimensional
art-“taking a drawing from a sheet of paper and giving it shape and angles, making it realistic,
bringing it to life.” Josiah plans to return to her home country of Liberia to build a fashion
design school.

Amanda Steele, University of Rhode Island, has the goal of working in the military
textile industry. She says, “Innovations in textiles can provide a huge advantage to the men and
women fighting for America; keeping these men and women safe at battle means a great deal to me.”
She is studying textile science in hopes of being one of the innovators in the industry.

Posted on July 5, 2011

Source: AATCC

It is no secret that nonwovens are developed for new market applications virtually every day. Just
in the area of disposable products, they qualify today for a seemingly infinite number of end-uses.
For decades, nonwovens were produced only in the West, thanks to the advanced machinery used by
Western nonwovens suppliers. But, as in almost every other sector of the textile industry,
cutting-edge machinery has also arrived in Asia.

Different Results

The Asian nonwovens industry shows a different face in various countries. However, China has
been the biggest market player in recent years, and in 2010 was responsible for 65.2 percent of the
total nonwovens production of nearly 2.9 million metric tons; followed by Japan with 10.9 percent;
Korea, 7.8 percent; India, 6.1 percent; and Taiwan, 5.2 percent, according to the latest data from
the China Nonwovens Technical Association (CNTA). Table 1 shows nonwovens production volumes in the
last two years, which correspond to the period of the recent global financial crisis.

The increase is considerable. If one compares the 2010 production figures to those from 2001,
when India didn’t have any significant production, overall nonwovens production has tripled in Asia
(See Table 2).

China increased its output nearly fivefold within 10 years, reflecting the country’s heavy
infrastructure investment – for example, for new roads. The other countries also are steadily
increasing nonwovens output, but not as much as China.

For example, according to China’s 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015), more than 45 million jobs
are to be created in urban areas, which means there will be a lot of building and road
construction, for which products such as geotextiles made of nonwovens are very much in the focus.

Process Technology

Table 3 shows production volumes for the different bonding technologies used to produce
nonwovens in the four top producing countries in 2010.

Spunbonds/meltblowns top the list with 44.47 percent of the total, thanks to their
capabilities to produce large quantities. However, needlepunched nonwovens rank second with 26.45
percent, which demonstrates that technology’s unique flexibility to process virtually all fiber
types, whether virgin or recycled. Spunlace technology will be gaining ground in the future, thanks
to its growing flexibility and extended weight range as well as a gradually increasing production
speed — which includes the use of modern high-speed cards, which were the bottleneck up to now.

Bright Future

Nonwovens, or felts, and industrial fabrics are not an invention of the present day and age.
The ancient Egyptians knew how to employ textile reinforcements long ago. Over the last two
decades, nonwovens have been one of the few textile industry sectors to grow between 5 and 10
percent every year.

One big advantage in the sale of nonwovens is their proximity to the market. Most products
are tailor-made. The most important point in production is the know-how, not the quantity to be
produced. Until recently, technical textiles were mainly a success in Western countries, thanks to
the machinery, equipment and superior knowledge of the production processes in those countries.
Those times are gone. Industrial fabrics are by far not a substitute for traditional fabrics, but
the basis for new products. The area of end-uses is seemingly endless, and for Asian producers as
well.

June 28, 2011

Katmandu Partners LLC — an Upland, Calif.-based full-service coloration and apparel company — has
introduced Kinetic Colorization™, a short-run, demand-activated coloring and printing technology.
Developed by Critical Mass, the technology is expected to bring fabric dyeing and apparel
manufacturing back to the United States from overseas, as it enables quick production and color
changes, thereby allowing customers to sample variations of styles without incurring the high costs
associated with sample production. It also enables production on demand, which facilitates quick
response to consumer preferences.

According to Katmandu, Kinetic Colorization is an advanced form of dye sublimation. The
proprietary technology sets off the energy stored in high-tech fabrics to create micro tunnels that
transport the dye through the center of the fiber, permanently trapping color below the fabric’s
surface. Unlike most conventional fabric coloring processes, the technology does not require the
use of water or chemicals, so it leaves no toxic residue. The process also can be used to dye many
nylons that previously could not be dyed using any form of sublimation. Katmandu reports the
process does not affect the performance features of a garment, and that fabrics colored using the
process demonstrate vibrant color, good wash fade resistance, durability and abrasion resistance.

“Kinetic Colorization is a replacement for both traditional wet printing and chemical dye
processes,” said Mark Robinson, president, Katmandu Partners. “Using energy multipliers, Kinetic
Colorization vastly improves energy conservation, product differentiation, and economics of
traditional wet printing.”

Kinetic Colorization facilitates a high degree of dyeing control and enables both
pass-through color and pattern print coloration for customizable items such as fully reversible
single-ply garments and double-sided garments with different colors and patterns on each side. The
process may be used on apparel, military fabrics, home décor and point-of-purchase signage, among
other applications.

“We are working with surf companies, active wear apparel companies, outdoor backpack
companies as well as some of the specialty mills and the military with regards to coloring their
fabrics,” said Brian Henry of Katmandu.

June 28, 2011

India-based commission dyer Selvam Process recently installed a Montex 6500 tenter built by
China-based Monforts Fong’s Textile Machinery Co. Ltd. — a joint venture between Germany-based A.
Monforts Textilmaschinen GmbH & Co. KG. and Hong Kong-based Fong’s Industries Co. Ltd. — and
supplied by ATE Enterprises. Monforts reports it is the first Montex 6500 to be installed in India.
Selvam Process will use the tenter in its open-width heat-setting and finishing operations. Founded
in 1990, the company has traditionally processed tubular knitwear, and wanted to add open-width
finishing capabilities.

“We started to notice exporters were beginning to express an open-width preference in 2009,
offering less wastage,” said S. Raju, owner, Selvan Process. Raju began to look for a “total
solution” to enable the company to process both tubular and open-width knitwear in-house. “Savings
of as much as 3 percent can be made with open-width production compared with tubular finishing,” he
said.

Selvam Process dyes knitwear including 100-percent cotton, interlock, single jersey, rib,
honeycomb and fleece for customers such as GAP, M&S, AG, Mack and Ferro. The company also
recently introduced a range of blends incorporating polyester/cotton, polyester and viscose, and
also is beginning to offer dyed Lycra® blends, which require heat-set treatment.

“The new 8-chamber Montex stenter will process up to 15 [tons per day],” Raju said. “This
additional capacity will not only include our own in-house open-width production but also knitwear
from other local dyers for heat set treatment.”

The installed Montex 6500 has eight chambers and twin padders, and can handle fabric weights
from 110-grams-per-square-meter (g/m2) single jersey to 300-g/m2 fleece. Regarding the decision to
add the Montex 6500, Raju said: “With conventional dyeing techniques, the unit can only be used as
a dryer. The Monforts stenter is a multi-purpose unit offering drying, heat setting, curing,
coating and finishing.” Raju also noted that the tenter can apply heat setting and finishing to
both sides of the fabric; and softeners may be added during the finishing process.

June 28, 2011

Sweden-based OrganoClick AB, a developer and provider of biofiber materials and chemical products,
has introduced two technologies based on biodegradable ingredients — OrganoTex™, a water-repellent
finish for cellulose-based fabrics that uses no fluorocarbons or other chemicals that are toxic to
the environment; and OC-biobinder™, a biopolymer-based binder that is used to improve mechanical
properties of cellulose-based nonwoven and coated textiles.

“The textile processing industry has for many years relied on chemicals that are very
effective, but on the other hand are often not degradable in nature and even may cause severe
effects on eco-systems or on human health,” said Mårten Hellberg, CEO, OrganoClick. “As customers
are starting to realize this problem, we believe that our new products have a tremendous potential
for textile manufacturers or textile product brands desiring to combine sustainable and organic
textiles with functionality.”

OrganoTex technology involves binding of a highly hydrophobic, biodegradable bio-additive to
the fiber via strong covalent chemical bonds that are highly resistant to laundering, according to
OrganoClick. The finish can be applied using dipping, padding and other conventional application
methods. The company adds that the water-repellency is durable and effective for the normal life of
the textile product.

OC-biobinder technology involves use of a polysaccaride derivate to bind the fibers together
via strong covalent chemical bonds, thereby enhancing the stiffness or strength of nonwovens and
other textiles. The binder can be applied using conventional methods. The polysaccaride derivate
comes from renewable sources, is biodegradable and is nontoxic to humans; and it can be used in
place of chemical, petroleum-based binders, according to the company.

June 28, 2011

The Consumer Division of Sawgrass Technologies Inc. — a Charleston, S.C.-based developer of digital
printing technologies — has introduced a SubliJet®-R sublimation printing solution for Ricoh Aficio
GX7000 and Ricoh Aficio GX e3300N inkjet printers that is compatible with Apple’s Mac operating
system (Mac OS). The Ricoh Aficio GX7000 and GX e3300N are business-class sublimation printing
platforms that use Ricoh’s GelSprinter technology and deliver up to 144 sublimation transfers per
hour.

SubliJet-R is a high-viscosity gel sublimation ink used to print on polyester fabrics or
articles that have a polymer coating. According to Sawgrass, the ink produces premium, full-color
images that will not crack, peel or wash away. The Mac OS solution enables Mac users to personalize
and customize a variety of consumer products using full-color and photographic images. It includes
MacProfile, a color management software bundle that is designed to work with Adobe® Photoshop®,
Illustrator® and Photoshop Elements. MacProfile is International Color Consortium (ICC)-profile
optimized; and includes Sawgrass’s Palette Swatch Library and Proofing Palette, which offer exact
color matching when used together, Sawgrass reports.

June 28, 2011