Myant and SoftWear Automation were crowned the winners of two new exciting categories at last night’s Future Textile Awards – Best Innovation: E-textiles and Machine Digitalisation.

Organised by WTiN, the fourth edition of the annual awards, which celebrates the best innovations in the technical textiles and related industries, was attended by around 100 guests and saw 11 leading companies honoured for their cutting-edge products, processes and treatments. It was held during WTiN’s ongoing Innovate Textile & Apparel (ITA) Europe event (6-8 November) at Novotel Amsterdam City – a brand new event comprising three conferences and a host of networking opportunities.

Reflecting the digital movement that’s taking place across the textiles industry, Myant was honoured for its SKIIN smart underwear – tech-filled undergarments that can detect signals from the body 24/7 and deliver bi-directional feedback. The judges praised the technology’s focus on promoting better health through textiles.

SoftWear Automation was honoured for its SEWBOT machine vision – a platform for industrial sewing automation. The judges stated that SEWBOT meets the growing demand for full automation and customisation among the textiles industry, calling it a ‘key component’ in the move towards Industry 4.0.

This year’s Innovative Start-Up award also provided a nod to digitalisation – presented to Textile Instruments for its passive wireless fabric sensor, FabricIQ. It enables the health monitoring of all living beings. 

Meanwhile, Covestro and Polartec scooped their third Future Textile Award to date, with Covestro bagging the Best Innovation: Clothing Textiles prize for its new waterborne coating for waterproof, breathable fabrics, and Polartec succeeding in the Sustainable Textiles category for its Power Air Warm fabric technology. It follows Covestro’s triumphant win at the 2015 awards, where it scored in two categories – Innovator of the Year and Sustainable Textiles; while Polartec previously won Most Innovative Medium Company in 2014 and 2015.

This year also saw consecutive wins from PressCise, which once again won the Medical Textiles category for its Lundatex compression stocking, and Carrington Textiles, which claimed the Best Innovation: Protective Textiles award for its new flame-retardant product, Flameflex 275.

WTiN launched the Future Textile Awards (formerly the Future Materials Awards) in 2014, to recognise the outstanding achievements of companies and individuals across the technical textiles sector.

Winner line-up

  1. Best Innovation: Clothing Textiles – Covestro (new waterborne coating for waterproof breathable fabrics)
  2. Best Innovation: Home Textiles – Aleph (LaForte 340 Superwide Format for digital printing)
  3. Best Innovation: Mobile Textiles – Welspun India (an innovative product to replace conventional towels used by passengers of India’s railway system)
  4. Best Innovation: Medical Textiles – PressCise (Lundatex compression stocking)
  5. Best Innovation: Protective Textiles – Carrington Textiles (Flameflex 275)
  6. Best Innovation: Sports Textiles – Amphibio (amphibious garment based on biomimicry)
  7. Best Innovation: Sustainable Textiles – Polartec (Power Air Warm fabric technology)
  8. Best Innovation: Textile Chemistry – Synthomer (Litex QuickShield Technology)
  9. Best Innovation: E-textiles – Myant (SKIIN smart underwear)
  10. Best Innovation: Machine Digitalisation – SoftWear Automation (SEWBOT machine vision)
  11. Best Innovative Start-Up – Textile Instruments (passive wireless fabric sensor, FabricIQ).

The Future Textile Awards 2018 was sponsored by high-tech industrial group Oerlikon, and MTIX, developer of Multiplexed Laser Surface Enhancement (MLSE) technology for digital finishing.

For more information on the Future Textile Awards and ITA Europe, visit https://ita.wtin.com