Textile's New Tech
Technology investments in the textile market may revive the struggling sector, said experts at the recent Emerging Issues forum, held on the campus of North Carolina State University in Raleigh, N.C.
Wilbur L. Ross Jr.—the chief executive officer of New York–based WL Ross & Co. who bought Burlington Industries in bankruptcy court last year and is positioned to acquire bankrupt Cone Mills—told attendees that nanotechnology, the science of small to microscopic matter, can help the domestic textile market compete with offshore resources.
“In most other countries, they’re focused on low-cost labor, not technology,” Ross told attendees. “I’m a little obsessed that we in the textile industry must increase the technology content of our product.”
North Carolina, home to most of the country’s remaining textile mills, still employs about 170,000 textile workers. Employment, however, has fallen more than 30 percent during the past three years. The principal problem has been offshore competition.
Ross, who led the investment group that bought Burlington in November for $614 million, said new Burlington products, such as a water-repellent cotton fabric and a silk range called Nanocare, could revive the company and set an example for the industry to follow. The new fabrics are rolling out in shirts and pants at Old Navy, he said.
Brooks Brothers is using another nanotech product, Nanodry, in ties and sportswear, he added.
The financier also told attendees that the industry must restructure the way it does business, blaming high wages, poor trade agreements and customer relations, and excess capacity on its downfall.
“In some companies, there are six layers between the person who grows the cotton and the person who distributes it,” he said. “We no longer can afford six levels of profit.”
Other technology executives, including Scott Greenhalgh of Perkasie, Penn.–based Prodesco, pointed to diversification. Greenhalgh’s company began shifting product development to industrial fabrics and now sells to the medical and aerospace industries. The forum was hosted by the Institute for Emerging Issues, an initiatiative of the Kanan Institute of Engineering, Technology and Science at NCSU. —Robert McAllister
