EDITORIAL

Message of the CEO: New Year Targets and Goals

Dear Readers,

first, let me take the opportunity of this new Red Dot News edition to wish you all a new year full of happiness, prosperity and relief. Relief from the terrible adversity we had to face in 2020, both from personal and business life point of view, and that, hopefully, we will gradually resolve in the new year.

What is not going to disappear, if we strive to see the bright side of this catastrophic pandemic, is what we learned and will treasure forever. Resilience, solidarity, adaptivity are just some of the attributes that come to my mind when I look back to the last year. We are all more digital, smarter, reactive and conscious.
And all this perfectly applies to our industry, textiles.

The consequences of the severe Covid-19 outbreak were felt early on by textile manufacturers worldwide. In fact, hardly any other sector of business is as global as the textile industry with its supply chains and its distributions channels which often span several continents and we know that the pandemic heavily impacted fashion items consumption. Just consider that at the beginning of April, a survey by the International Textile Manufacturers Federation (ITMF) declared that 31% of all orders in the industry have been cancelled.

Nevertheless, I saw many of our Customers bravely and intelligently face the crisis for example by converting partially or totally their production to weave protective and isolation cloth fabric and by developing antibacterial and antiviral fabrics. As Itema, we constantly supported our Customers and we proudly saw our weaving machines being quickly customized to effectively weave fabrics for face masks, protective wear and greater functionality textiles.
Many of our Customers, just like us, introduced digital ways of working and meeting. Less travelling, more digital communication, more digital presentation of samples and innovative concepts. At Itema, we are working around the clock to set new benchmarks in connectivity and digitalization of our products and services.

Despite the uncertainties caused by the corona crisis, I am more than optimistic about the future of the textile industry. The above-mentioned facts are witness statements of how this industry is capable to reinvent itself by innovating its products and drastically changing its processes if necessary. Moreover, sustainability and CSR topics are more and more central in all the discussions about textiles and fabrics production, enabling all of us to look with optimism at a greener, more ethical and sustainable future for this industry.

Focusing on the 2020 of Itema Group, I can testify that by this experience our companies and our people have been fortified and made even more effective. The financial results are encouraging too. Focusing on the weaving machines sales, we registered +4% compared to 2019. Particularly good performances have been guaranteed to us in Turkey, where the home textile sector – especially furnishing, curtains and bed sheeting – that our company is traditionally leading, registered a significant increase in production and thus reflecting in new investments in advanced weaving technology.

Furthermore, we entered 2021 with a consistent order backlog, thus allowing us to positively look at a promising 2021. And this is of fundamental importance to me, since our strategic projects pipeline is full of significant and disrupting initiatives with the ultimate target to generate value for our Customers and stakeholders.

Coming now to the content of this Winter 2021 Red Dot News Edition, I am pleased to share with you in the Technology Corner the news of the final acquisition of Itematech, whose activities have been transferred to Itema SpA starting from January 1, 2021. With this transaction, we renovate and confirm our intention in investing and developing applications and technologies exclusively dedicated to technical fabrics and special styles, since we believe that a highly specialized sector like that of technical textiles deserves focus and specific resources. Therefore, through Itematech, Itema will continue to support its Customers with cutting-edge weaving technology and advanced technical solutions of which you can find an in-depth analysis in this article. Moreover, you will find a special focus on technical yarns and sustainability in the new section of our newsletter, “The Expert Talks”, with the special contribution for his edition of Radici Group.

As we are all experiencing on a daily basis, business and life in general is more and more digital and we have therefore launched the new academic year of our exclusive apprenticeship program with brand-new, innovative and highly educational contents. Discover more on the Itema Academy Digital program and the new talented young graduated that we welcomed on board at this link.

The Events section is unfortunately less crowded than I would like, but we share in any case the exhibitions that we are going to attend in 2021 – unless Covid-19 will force us to change our plans – and we also share some images and news about the two events that we attended in China, included the exclusive Italian Design Icons that, by invitation only, hosts in a luxury location in Shanghai the best of the Made in Italy technological design. And in case you missed any news about Itema, you can find our latest appearance on the press in Itema on the News and the most liked posts on our social media channels in Itema on Social Media – 2020 Review.

Unmissable our Weaving Excellence Diaries, that allow us to take you in a journey through some of our reference Customers in the world. This time with pride we will introduce you Sampietro, an Italian based high-end silk weaving company we deeply esteem.

Finally, we close this Red Dot News Edition with the Itema Group 2021 Calendar that we share with you in a digital format as wallpapers for your desktop. For the Itema Group 2021 Calendar we have been inspired by our beautiful mountains, the Orobie Alps in Bergamo province, where the Itema Headquarters is based. A real tribute to peace, nature, sustainability and positivity that you will enjoy month after month thanks to the amazing sceneries portrayed in the photographs that make up this calendar and which have been taken by the Itema’s colleague Claudio Ranza.

Now, enjoy your reading and stay tuned for the upcoming Itema Group updates.

Sincerely,
Ugo Ghilardi