PORTUGAL REVEALS ITSELF AT BOOT
The flexible escape ladder made in textile webbings of Artefita shows the escalation that Portuguese technical textiles have been making in the last few years. The evidences are also on the cables Alpha Ropes, that equip the boats of sailing champions, and the equipments of P&R Têxteis that helped international athletes to win several medals.
In this participation at Boot Düsseldorf, Artefita reveals the new flexible escape ladder made with textile webbings, as well as «a sleeve for cable protection and several boat mooring straps with tensors in stainless steel that allow the contact with salty water without damage the mechanism», indicates Gonzaga Oliveira, company’s administrator. Artefita is one of the most reputable producers of textile webbings, with a presence in 17 markets around the world and a turnover of 3.2 million Euros in 2010.
Cotesi, on its side, producer of the Alpha Ropes cables, exhibits its new nautical cable D Core XTM, a cable characterized «essentially by its low stretch and very high breaking load», explains Diogo Cayolla, former Olympic sailor, now a representative of the company.
ERT – Empresa de Revestimentos Têxteis shows in this trade fair two seats for boats with different textile structures coated with an impermeable membrane, where are used «microfibers and 3D textiles with a barrier for nautical use», as indicates João Brandão, company’s CEO.
Among the Portuguese exhibitors are also Damel, Elio-Kayaks and P&R Textiles. This last one, besides its own brand Onda, produces sport equipments for major brands as Adidas, Puma, Veltec, Trango, Ronhill, Astore, Ternua and Royal Bikewear. At the Beijing Olympic Games, it has produced the equipment for Usain Bolt, world record for 100m and 200m, and in 2009 has also produced equipments that were used at the FINA World Championship and in the International Bodybording Association (IBA) World Tour.
Portugal exported, in 2009, 129.8 thousand tons of technical textiles and functional apparel, worth 332.6 million Euros, which represents 9.3% of the exports of the Portuguese textile and apparel industry, with a market share of 1.8% in volume and 1.1% in value of the EU exports of this kind of product.
The participation of these Portuguese companies at Boot Düsseldorf is an initiative of Associação Selectiva Moda (stand D04, Hall 11), with the support of EU funds (Qren), inserted in the project From Portugal. Associação Selectiva Moda is an entity that promotes the internationalization of the Portuguese companies and for 2011 has a 61 international actions program in 26 different markets, directed to yarn, fabrics and accessories, fashion, home textiles and decoration and technical textiles, with an investment of 7.43 million Euros.
