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PVH has just appointed Kelly Chu as the new global strategy manager for Calvin Klein. The American group, owner of other brands such as Tommy Hilfiger, Arrow, Izod, Van Heusen, among others, is strengthening Calvin Klein’s force with this new naming.
Kelly Chu took over her position at Calvin Klein this February. Prior to joining the PVH family, the manager operated at Coach, the latter being one of the major brands of the American luxury fashion holding, Tapestry. Chu first joined Coach in February 2018 as senior analyst of global finance, a post she occupied for a year and seven months before being promoted as senior analyst for North America’s retail finance of Coach, a role she maintained for seven months up until her transfer to Calvin Klein.
The now manager, who obtained her bachelor’s degree in Economics, Minor in Entrepreneurship & Management at The Johns Hopkins University in Maryland also worked for J.P Morgan for almost two years as an investment banking analyst. The American company that has been focusing on strengthening its team, recently the group also appointed Tom Chu as regional president of Asia Pacific, who took office on February 1. The holding company is coursing a fluid path, after completing the payment of the acquisition of Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, and Warnaco at the end of last year. “We are looking to make another acquisition, we’re looking at a brand, or portfolio of brands, that we can layer on to our operating platform,” said Emanuel Chirico, chairman and chief executive officer of PVH.
The American group that counts over 38,000 associates operating in over 40 countries, recorded a revenue of 9.7 billion dollars in its last fiscal year. PVH’s latest financial report corresponds to its third quarter of 2019 in which the group registered a net income of 208.9 million dollars, down 13.9% year-on-year and reached sales of 2.4 billion dollars, up 2.38% than the previous year. Specifically, Calvin Klein’s revenue increased by 1%, to 969 million for the third quarter.
Irish brand Primark plans to open two new stores in the American market. These stores will opene at American Dream, New Jersey, Sawgrass Mills, Florida.
The low-cost company expects its sales to grow by 4.2 per cent ahead of last year in the first half. In the UK, the company expects a growth of 3.0 per cent in clothing, footwear, and accessories, which will be driven by new selling space and partially offset by a 1.3 per cent decline in like-for-like sales. Primark saw positive results in the UK market over November and December. However, this growth has come to fall in January and February in comparison to the prior year.
The market with the biggest forecasts is that of the Eurozone, it is expected to grow by 5.3 per cent ahead of last year at constant currency with particularly strong sales growth in France, Belgium, and Italy. The recently opened store in Milan exceeded expectations along with the store in Ljubljana that also kept a constant solid trade.
Gartex Texprocess will be held in Mumbai from, March 19 to 21, 2020. This is a textile and garment machinery exhibition. The show will include: garment machinery that will provide insights into technological developments in the garment manufacturing sector. Innovative products and technologies, defining latest trends in the industry, will be showcased. The intent is to reach out to the leading textile hubs of South and West India.
Gartex Texprocess is a platform that has been instrumental in unifying various stakeholders within the garment and textile manufacturing supply chain. Now the show is being held for the first time in Mumbai. Exhibitors will present the latest innovations, machines, plants, processes and services to various stakeholders in the industry, including manufacturers and suppliers. The event is aimed at providing business opportunities to international and national suppliers as well as trade visitors through networking sessions with industry experts and engaging in investment opportunities.
Gartex unifies various stakeholders within the garment and textile manufacturing supply chain and provides stakeholders greater accessibility to their buyers in the western and southern regions. This edition will complement the existing New Delhi edition while also increasing the expanse of the show by reaching out to smaller-sized companies and start-ups in the region.
The new Oerlikon Barmag eAFK Evo promises superior speeds, greater productivity and consistently high product quality, along with lower energy consumption and simpler operation vis-à-vis comparable market solutions. In particular, the machine has two new value-added features, the optimized, innovative EvoHeater and the EvoCooler, a completely newly developed active cooling unit.
Using Oerlikon polycondensation and extrusion systems, the Indian manmade fiber companies manufacture polyester, nylon and polypropylene. Oerlikon offers the entire process chain, from the melt to the textured yarn or the fibers and including the necessary semi and fully automated logistics process, from a single source. Oerlikon is known for its brands Barmag, Neumag and Nonwoven.
The 24-end WINGS FDY PA makes the efficient production of FDY PA6 yarns a reality. The enclosed draw unit ensures low spin finish emissions, offering a safe working environment. Offering swift string-up, the optimized yarn path of the tried-and-tested WINGS FDY PET system is united with the high relaxing performance of conventional polyamide systems to create a completely new concept. The result is outstanding yarn properties, superlative dyeability, optimum process performance and high full package rate. Perfect package build guarantees excellent further processing properties in the downstream processes. With a 116-mm stroke, this winder makes high package weights possible, therefore delivering added-value yarns for further processing. As a consequence, yarn manufacturers can give themselves a competitive advantage in the marketplace.
Punjab may soon get a mega textile park. The state has a textile eco-system and leading local companies do have the potential to invest at a large level. Some Punjab-based companies already have major operations in other states and are continuously investing out of Punjab. It is very difficult to get 1,000 acres of land in established hubs like Ludhiana, and the industry might not shift or invest outside Ludhiana.
Once the park is built, it can act as a textile growth hub across the entire Northern region to drive the textile eco-system, surrounded by clusters like Ludhiana, for sustainably generating employment and exports for the future. The spinning sector might not invest as Punjab’s textile policy, compared to that of Maharashtra and Gujarat, is less favorable for the industry.
But down the line, all other segments, be they knitters, weavers or garment manufacturers, have an incentive to invest in such parks as overall they are doing well. The proposed mega textile park would throw more opportunities for the textile industry to cater to domestic markets and also the international market. Punjab is one of the leading textile states of India. <Ten such mega textile parks have been proposed across India
OTEXA’s figures indicate, India exported kid’s wear worth $265.74 million to the US in 2019. That’s around 12 per cent of total kid’s wear import value of the US, which stood at $2.26 billion. India noted rise despite the US falling in its kid’s wear by 3.11 per cent on Y-o-Y basis. China, with an export value of $840.50 million, again became an epicentre of this disruption as it plunged by significant 16.05 per cent and gave an opportunity to other countries to capture the shift.
Data suggests India was able to grab the shift due to its ability of making quality kid’s wear. The closest competitor for India in the US market is Vietnam, which shipped $260.51 million worth, marking 12.18 per cent growth. It is believed that moving business from China is bound to go to Vietnam, which interestingly did not happen in kid’s wear category in 2019, if data is anything to go by.
Bangladesh’s growth too remained decent as it upped it kid’s wear export to the US by 8.18 per cent to ship $207.93 worth of kids’ apparels. Bangladesh is diversifying successfully in product categories other than basic commodities like T-shirts, trousers and shirts.
India’s withdrawal of the anti-dumping duty on purified terephthalic acid (PTA) would further improve the affordability of manmade textiles. In addition, the removal of duty would lead to higher imports, thereby reducing supplier concentration and improving the bargaining power of downstream producers. Consequently, there would be an improvement in the profitability and credit metrics of sector companies.
PTA, along with mono ethylene glycol (MEG), accounts for almost 80 per cent of the total raw material cost involved in the manufacturing of chips and granules in the manmade fiber sector. In fiscal 2018-19, India had a PTA production capacity of around seven million tons. During February 2020, PTA prices fell by ten per cent on account of a fall in crude prices, resulting from a decline in demand for the same. Prices are likely to fall further in fiscal 2020-21.
Removal of duty is expected to exert pressure on the realisations of domestic PTA manufacturers and lead to increased imports from countries like China. However, the coronavirus outbreak in China would remain a key factor, as that has led to uncertainties regarding supply in the short term. China has a PTA production capacity of 45 million tons, of which 35 million tons are consumed locally, and the remaining is exported.
Carbon emissions throughout the full value chain of Ikea furniture fell 4.3 per cent last year. This was driven by a large increase of renewable energy in the production of Ikea products plus significant increases in energy efficiency of the lighting and appliances range. Ikea is aiming for its value chain to be climate positive - where it cuts more greenhouse gas emissions than it emits - by 2030. This includes everything from the production of raw materials and products through to customers' use and disposal. Ikea produces around ten per cent of its range itself, mainly wood-based products, and sources the rest from suppliers. To speed things up, in November Ikea earmarked 100 million euros for encouraging direct suppliers to switch to renewable energy and an additional 100 million euros for projects to remove carbon from the atmosphere through reforestation and forest protection.
Ikea, the world’s biggest furniture brand, is hopeful emissions in the value chain will shrink further this year. Ikea India has undertaken a campaign which aims at inspiring and enabling people to reduce their carbon footprint by using more climate-friendly products. There are currently 403 Ikea stores in 49 countries. It currently has more than 50 suppliers with 45,000 direct employees and 4,00,000 people in the extended supply chain.
Egypt’s cotton exports fell 38.6 per cent from September to November 2019 compared to the same period last year. Reason: decreased cotton production. The total amount of cotton locally consumed increased 14.1 per cent over the same period. The quantity of ginned cotton decreased 32.3 per cent.
Egypt is planning to develop the cotton industry, diversify its uses in the industry and thus improve the quality of products manufactured by Egyptian cotton, making them more appealing to global markets. Egyptian cotton production is on course to rebound with help from a devalued currency and a bigger cultivation area, recovering from a slide in exports of the world-famous crop since 2011 that was caused by a drop in quality. Output fell drastically in 2011, when political upheaval meant regulations to maintain quality were not enforced.
Egypt has regulated cotton trading. The decree limits cotton trading to specified collection points. Farmers are allowed to get the highest possible price through auctions, and prices will be set according to international cotton prices and the comparative advantage of Egyptian cotton. The decree also links all collection points electronically to ensure transparency, with a consideration for applying the new system through new collection points in some governorates as a pilot version to avoid any problems in the future.
As per National Board of Revenue, imports from China slumped 21 per cent year-on-year in volume in the one and a half months to February 15 amid supply disruption caused by the Coronavirus. Businesses imported 36 lakh tonne of products in the first seven months of fiscal 2019-20, down 19 per cent from a year earlier. In monetary terms, imports also declined this year compared with the same period a year ago, said the revenue administration in a report on the possible impact of the outbreak in the world's second largest economy.
Bangladesh's main export earner apparel and textile industry is highly dependent on China for cotton yarn and fabrics, textile fabrics and garments accessories. It also suggested considering alternative sources to import parts of mobile phones to support the budding mobile handset assembling sector.
China is the biggest trading partner of Bangladesh and the biggest source for imports. The world's second largest economy accounted for more than a fifth of the country's imports of $56 billion in fiscal 2018-19, Bangladesh Bank data showed. The NBR report comes amid growing concerns among businesses about potential supply disruption of raw materials, intermediate goods and other materials brought about by the coronavirus outbreak in December last year.
The NBR report assessed the possible effects of the coronavirus pandemic on export and imports by taking seven top-ranked inbound and outbound items to and from China.
