Interview with Thomas Archner

Thomas Archner
CEO and MD
Xorella

Textile machines & equipment: China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia & Vietnam are important

Xorella, a German manufacturer of textile machines and equipment, has a reputation for performance, reliability and energy efficiency in the textile machinery industry. Thomas Archner, CEO and MD of Xorella talks about the steam setting and conditioning equipment industry in detail with Fibre2Fashion.com

What is the size of the global industry for steam setting and conditioning equipment? How do you rate the global demand for such equipment from Germany?

Beside few renowned brands from Europe like Xorella, competitors for steam setting and conditioning equipment have increased during the past years, mainly from Asia. Nevertheless, there is a robust demand for machines with German technology, especially for installation in automatic transportation and packing lines. Xorella is the leading manufacturer of such machinery and equipment.

What is the penetration rate of robotics and Industry 4.0 in global textile machinery manufacturing, especially into steam setting and conditioning equipment?

Xorella is a member of CHTC Fong's Industries Group. The manufacturing unit of CHTC Fong's in Shenzhen, People's Republic of China is highly-automated, with robots. The whole production process is supported by a sophisticated ERP software system. By 2017, the factory will move to a brand new manufacturing facility in Zhongshan in China. The plan is to use this move to further increase automation in our production processes in the sense of Industry 4.0.

Which are the big markets for your products, and which ones are coming up in a big way?

Xorella products are popular around the world. Turkey has always been a strong market for us. In the US, there is a revival of investment in textile manufacturing currently, especially in the spinning of yarn, mainly due to low energy costs. In Asia, Bangladesh continues to invest in spinning mills, but other countries like China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia and Vietnam are also important for us.

What sustainability initiatives does Xorella follow?

Sustainability is not new to Xorella. Energy consumption has already been reduced close to physical limitation with the introduction of 'XO Heating System'. With waterless vacuum technology, 'XO Ecopac' customers have the option to eliminate cooling water consumption and minimise power consumption for vacuum processes. This was introduced a few years ago, and became more popular. Xorella machines are made of stainless steel to ensure a long lifetime of every machine, which saves raw materials and resources.

What is the USP of your products as compared to your competitors?

It has been confirmed by numerous customers that Xorella machines offer outstanding performance and reliability at lowest consumption of precious resources.

Please share details of your last fiscal, and your expectations from the coming two fiscals.

Xorella as a brand from Fong's Europe Gmbh and being part of the CHTC Fong's Group contributed to the revenue of the whole group as expected in 2014, and will do so this year in 2015. Based on the very positive response at ITMA 2015 in Milan, we expect that Xorella's contribution to revenue and the bottom line of the CHTC Fong's Group will grow in the coming years.

What is the budget allocated towards R&D, and what are your latest research findings?

The share of Xorella in our R&D budget was rather high during the last years, approximately 10 per cent of the achieved annual revenue. The result of such R&D efforts was the market introduction of our new machine model XO Trend, shown to the public at ITMA Milan 2015 for the first time.

Published on: 18/12/2015

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.