Indonesia-based PT. South Pacific Viscose (SPV), a subsidiary of Austria-based cellulosic fiber
producer Lenzing AG, has commissioned its fourth viscose fiber production line. The line represents
a US$150 million investment, Lenzing’s largest recent single investment project and part of an
overall investment of $500 million in SPV, and adds 60,000 metric tons of production capacity for
textile and nonwoven applications. SPV now has an annual production capacity of 220,000 metric tons
and is the largest viscose fiber production facility in Asia and the second-largest such facility
within Lenzing’s global operations.

As part of the investment, SPV also added a state-of-the-art 21-megawatt power station
equipped with a multi-fuel fluidized boiler and attached steam turbine, a 300-metric ton-daily
capacity sulfuric acid plant, a carbon disulfide recovery plant, and process- and wastewater
facilities. Lenzing reports these improvements have brought SPV into compliance with the latest
environmental standards. In addition, SPV has initiated a debottlenecking program to increase
annual production capacity to 238,000 metric tons.

“Indonesia and the whole of Asia are Lenzing’s single most important sales market. The
extension of PT. South Pacific Viscose … marks our commitment to our customers in this part of
the world,” said Peter Untersperger, chairman of Lenzing’s Management Board. He added that once all
of Lenzing’s current investment projects are completed in 2012, about half of the group’s projected
total fiber production capacity, or 378,000 metric tons, will be located in Asia. In the longer
term, Lenzing plans to have an overall capacity of one million metric tons and projects more than
half of that will be located in Asia.

SPV is one of the biggest employers in the region, having a workforce of 1,656 employees, and
also provides financial support to schools, child and health care facilities in its community.

May 18, 2010

Montreal-based Dorel Industries Inc. — a manufacturer of juvenile and bicycle products and home
furnishings — has opened its new Apparel Footwear Group Division (AFG) facility in British
Columbia. The company invested $3 million to renovate a 70,000-square-foot complex, which now
houses AFG’s manufacturing and distribution operations as well as the company’s global design and
marketing headquarters. The AFG division comprises the Sugoi, Cannondale, GT, Schwinn, Iron Horse
and Mongoose brands and is part of Dorel’s Recreational/Leisure segment.

“This facility will allow AFG to increase its custom apparel capacity and offer highly
competitive lead times,” said Martin Schwartz, president and CEO, Dorel. “We’ve barely scratched
the surface in this expanding market and we expect AFG to triple its custom apparel business within
five years.”

“The opportunity to significantly upgrade our AFG operations with a new and improved facility
is positioning the entire division for global growth,” says Chris Fuentes, president, AFG. “By
investing in state-of-the-art technology such as digital printing and high speed precision
sublimation, we expect to create an important speed to market advantage.”

May 18, 2010

The Sheep Venture Co. (SVC) — a wholly owned for-profit company operated by the Englewood,
Colo.-based American Sheep Industry Association — has received a loan from the National Livestock
Producers Association’s Sheep Loan Fund Committee for the purchase of a continuous wool-top
chlorine/polymer treatment equipment line that will modify fiber in wool products, enabling them to
be machine-washed and dried without shrinking and meet “Total Easy Care” consumer standards. The
manufacturing line will be used to process both military and commercial wool products.

More than 2 million pounds of wool for commercial markets currently are shrink-treated in
foreign countries. “Currently, this wool shrink-treatment process is only available overseas, which
increases costs, delivery times and eligibility for military wool products,” said Margaret Soulen
Hinson, president, SVC. “Of concern is that our domestic mills are less competitive without this
process and it will prohibit the use of washable wool products by the military, which is American
wool’s largest domestic customer.” The Berry Amendment stipulates that products purchased by the
U.S. Department of Defense must be of U.S. origin whenever possible.

Hinson stated that the process not only will help establish new business but also will remove
the risk of losing current military knitwear business because a dependable shrink-treatment process
has not been available in the United States. “Domestically processing U.S. wool from sheep to
garment will lead to increased demand for U.S. wool products, which in turn will increase domestic
demand for our wool.”

The new line, to be installed at Jamestown, S.C.-based Chargeurs Wool USA Inc., will enable
companies to apply the washable treatment to U.S. wool products. The equipment is scheduled to
arrive this fall and will be installed and commissioned sometime early winter. SVC expects the line
to be in full production by the beginning of 2011.



May 18, 2010

BOENNIGHEIM, Germany — May 5, 2010 — The capacity of a textile implant to be tolerated by the
body – known as biotolerance – plays an important role in regenerative medicine. Nevertheless, the
body does not always tolerate textile implants. Even modern implants made of resorbable
biopolymers, such as polylactic acid, break down in the body after a certain period of time and
decompose into individual acidic components. They can then cause considerable problems around the
implantation site ranging from inflammations to rejection. That is why biotolerability is a
decisive factor in the rapid generation of blood vessels at the implantation site (known as
angiogenesis). New capillaries ensure that acidic decomposition products resulting from the
breakdown of bioresorbable textile implants can be quickly transported away from the area. At the
same time, the new blood supply guarantees that cells involved in building up tissue receive
sufficient nutrients and the implant is integrated into the tissue rather than being encapsulated
as a foreign body. 

The Institute for Hygiene and Biotechnology (IHB) at Hohenstein has long been doing research
on how formation of vascular tissue can be stimulated specifically on textile implants. Only
recently, a research team made up of doctors and human biologists led by Prof. Dr. Dirk Hoefer
showed that specially modified textile fibres are also suited for functioning as a matrix for adult
human stem cells on the basis of which new, healthy tissue can be developed. 

Now the scientists at Hohenstein have successfully carried out a ground-breaking experiment
with respect to the tolerability of implants using an animal-free substitute method known as the
chorioallantoic membrane assay. Textiles that had been colonised with stem cells were applied onto
a chicken egg membrane with a dense network of blood vessels. The dense network of blood vessels of
the CAM and its lack of immune competence create optimal conditions for investigation of a
functional circulatory system. The scientists aim was to have the implant itself release the growth
factors required to stimulate the formation of new blood vessels. The stem cells were to assume
this function. The researchers first coated the fibres of the textile implants with specific
adhesion molecules, then colonised them with adult human stem cells that are known to release
growth factors for new blood vessels. In order to follow precisely the fate of the stem cells,
before they were introduced to the implant, the “all-rounders” were geneticallymodified so that
they produced a red, fluorescent pigment that allowed the integration of the stem cells in the
surrounding tissue to be visually monitored.

In several test series conducted in this way, the researchers observed directed
vascularisation within the textile implant microscopically and macroscopically. New blood vessels
grew within the implant and formed a functional capillary network. If the textiles were colonised
with connective tissue cells that did not release growth factors, vascularisation did not occur.The
Institute for Hygiene and Biotechnology’s new results may be used in future approaches in
regenerative medicine. Implants colonised with a patient’s stem cells could serve as biologic
textile implants (e.g. hernia mesh implants) that can be integrated into the patient’s body more
quickly and without rejection in order to regenerate damaged tissues.  The system applied at
Hohenstein also makes it possible to gain insights into many other aspects of circulation in
textile implants and routinely optimise these implants for medical use. This is an important
milestone in the further development of textile regenerative medicine. The researchers at
Hohenstein intend to publish their results in a specialist scientific journal.

Posted on May 18, 2010

Press Release Courtesy of the Hohenstein Institute