Biomimicry, biopolymers, fire retardents, and fluorocarbon free water repellent functional garments are among the hot technological innovation topics in the industry today. Marten Hellberg, CEO of Swedish company OrganoClick AB, talks about these technologies and sheds some light on the recent funding and financial aspects of his company in an interview with Fibre2Fashion.
What new innovations are in the pipeline from OrganoClick?
An area that we are looking at is fire retardants.
Green technology often comes at a cost. Wouldn't it be easier to accept and implement if the burden of cost is reduced? Also, wouldn't volumes, more so in Asian countries, help in recovering the cost of research and development of that technology? What are your thoughts on this? Don't you think someone needs to take that first step to mould opinion and action in this direction?
The volumes, in the textile industry, are definitely concentrated in Asia. So Asia is definitely an area of focus, and one of the main reasons for us collecting capital through a public funding. We are looking forward to expand to Asian countries. It is definitely a priority for us at the moment.
What are the latest technological innovations taking place in green chemical and material technologies?
There are so many things happening right now in this direction. I would say biomimicry is one of the hottest technological trends. That would mean looking at naturally-occurring materials and functions, and replicating them into industrially-produced materials with similar properties. Spider webs, for example, have immense strength, and its properties can be replicated into fibres for similar strength. Another topic of interest in Europe is that of biopolymers, which can be derived and developed from normal cellulosic pulp.
What is your annual turnover?
It took us around five years to develop the first product. Two years ago, we launched our first product and had revenues of EUR 0.3 million. Now, we have a turnover of around EUR 3 million and are aiming at EUR 6 million in 2015. We have just raised gross SEK 75 million (EUR 8 million).
Being a listed company, how do you expect the current fiscal year to turn out?
In terms of overall sales, we have just raised around EUR 8 million. We plan to grow our sales and marketing organisations in Europe and Asia with the capital. We are expecting very good sales and generating more revenue from last year.
What are the technological innovations taking place in the direction of sustainable functional garments?
An area that we are focussing right now is developing fluorocarbon-free water-repellent functional garments. Most of the water-repellent functional garments have fluorocarbon in them which are toxic in nature.
What part of the total capital collected is allocated for R&D?
We have a strong R&D setup in the company. It has remained our focus for the last eight years. But the main dimension for capital collected at this stage is for marketing and further expansion of the organisation. As we have a good R&D setup, we do not have a pressing need to invest more in R&D at the moment.
Any plans for expansion into other countries?
Yes, certainly. We are exploring new markets in Asia and in Germany. Our near-term plans are to enter the Asian market this year, and to enter the German market in 2016.
Published on: 19/02/2015
DISCLAIMER: All views and opinions expressed in this column are solely of the interviewee, and they do not reflect in any way the opinion of Fibre2Fashion.com.
