AEI Tèxtils, the Catalan Cluster of Advanced Textil Materials, participated at Techtextil 2024 from April 23^th to 26^th with a joint booth with several of its members: FINSA, Pont Aurell y Armengol, Hilados Egarfil, Technitiger, VTS Technical Textiles, Laminats Orient, Velutex Flock, Hilaturas Arnau and Polisilk.

Internationalization is key area of the cluster revised strategy addressing two major objectives: increasing the competitiveness of its members with facilitated access to third country markets and increasing visibility of its members at international level thanks to the cluster participation in key events, both in Europe and internationally.

 

Techtextil is the major trade fair for advanced textile materials and this edition counted with 102 participating nations, around 38,000 visitors and 1700 exhibitors. Hence, the joint participation promoted SMEs internationalization and increased the positioning of the Catalan advanced textile materials’ sector.

 

In addition to cluster members participating in the joint booth, this year 10 cluster members have also participated with their own booth: MITSA, Grobelastic, E. CIMA, Marina Textil, C.P. Aluart, Tanatex Chemicals, Tecstar Fiber, Incabo, Rosich y Puigdengolas and ANTEX.

During the four days in the trade fair, AEI Tèxtils organized and facilitated a series of activities to promote the networking of its members, offering space for meetings within its booth for cluster members without it, and organized informal networking and cocktails to facilitate interaction among the members and with other partners of the cluster. The cluster hosted tours from the  Textile ETP on High performance fibers and from ECOSYSTEX community of practice, both targeting European stakeholders in innovation community, where AEI Tèxtils presented its activities and the Regiogreentex project as well as some of its members within the booth. AEI Tèxtils also organized a tour for the textile engineering students from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia to present the Catalan ecosystem of advanced textile materials and the ADDTEX hub for sustainability and upskilling in Catalan textile industry.

 

In addition, AEI Tèxtils also promoted the positioning of the Catalan advanced textile materials sector with a presentation in the Techtextil Forum of the different initiatives the cluster and its members are conducting in relation to sustainability and circular economy, highlighting the synergies of the Catalan textile industry and their good practices.

 

Lastly, the cluster is organizing the webinar “Panorama Techtextil 24” on May 21^st to summarize major trends and innovations that were featured during this edition of the trade fair, as an exclusive service for its members.

 

These activities complement preparatory actions the cluster has taken over the past month such as the pre-Techtextil event in Terrassa on April 10^th to engage and foster networking among cluster members with international stakeholders from Portugal, Italy and France in the frame of ADMANTEX2i final event. In this Pre-Techtextil, AEI Tèxtils facilitated a speed dating session among the participants to have brief introduction among each other and to seed potential collaborations.

AEI Tèxtils is supporting internationalization of its members through different projects, deploying added value services such as joint missions with custom agendas. Its current calendar includes missions to Australia in November 2024 and to Arabia Saudi in February 2025.

 

Projects are tools for the cluster to support strategically its members with services and pilot actions such as organization of business missions, facilitating networking and matchmaking services for its members with international partners.

 

The different projects aim to support SMEs in identifying and exploiting growth opportunities worldwide through activities such as partnering missions, matchmaking events, cross-partnership webinars, circular economy business models, digitalization driver and cross-cultural approach, and lessons in building industrial resilience.

 

The booth at Techtextil was an opportunity for the cluster to showcase some of these strategic projects, such as ADDTEX, Regiogreentex, Admantex2i, xBUILD- EU and ZeroF.

 

Clusters, like AEI Tèxtils, are great connectors and facilitators for the industrial ecosystem to promote, facilitate, and support the innovation process of its members, fostering the green transition and digital transformation, as a key contribution to the increase the competitiveness of the advanced textile materials sector and its members.

 

Video AEI Tèxtils at Techtextil:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEmdWSLfigU