Textile & Apparel Digitalization Gets 4-Dimensional View In First US Multi-Event, Organized By WTIN
Colour Study by Vassilly Kandinsky 1912
LEEDS, England, March , 2019 -- With just two months to go before the opening of a unique American conference series, textile and apparel industry professionals are promised their most detailed view ever of the sector's advancing digitalization.
Top-ranking speakers have been lined up for the first Innovate Textile & Apparel Americas – comprising four distinct events over three days.
Organized by World Textile Information Network (WTiN), ITA Americas is hosted by NC State University's Wilson College of Textiles, in Raleigh, NC, from May 1-3, and its unique format will deliver deep insights into digital technologies, materials and business strategy.
Its elements are:
Digital Textile Workshop, with lectures and demonstrations on the latest technologies in areas of digital archiving, CAD, color management, digital printing, and virtual prototyping. Delivered in partnership with NC State University's Wilson College of Textiles.
The Textile 4.0 Conference, exploring emerging digital business models and introducing the latest application opportunities in smart factory development, including robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), and virtual or augmented reality.
Re:Think Materials, providing expert technical insights for product developers, including: market opportunities in connected textiles; conductive fiber and yarn; textiles for energy harvesting and storage; printed textile electronics; and the application possibilities of graphene and other '2D' materials.
Textile Business Futures, presented in conjunction with top textile and apparel industry consultants Gherzi and providing an intensive one-day introduction for C-level executives to learn about digital business strategy, risk management, return on investment, leadership and culture change.
Among the participating luminaries at The Textile 4.0 Conference, Stefan Weisenberger, SAP Senior Director for Mill Products, will explore how the Internet of Things (IoT) can act as an enabler for digital transformation of the textile and apparel sector.
At Re:Think Materials, Jason Cox, Director, Fiber Device Technology at Advanced Functional Fabrics of America (AFFOA) will focus on fabric platforms for fiber memory, data processing and computing; and the expanding smart textiles market scenario will be reviewed by Jerrold Wang, Research Analyst from Lux Research Inc.
At Textile Business Futures, AFFOA Chief Marketing Officer Eric Spackey will explore business growth strategy in the smart-textiles market. And PwC Director Ron Klein, together with colleague Juliane Stephan, Director – Digital Operations, at Strategy& (part of the PwC network) – will lead a workshop on smart factories.
The launch of Innovate Textile & Apparel Americas (https://itaamericas.wtin.com) follows a groundbreaking European event in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, last November.
It is being organized in partnership with NC State University and Gherzi, while sponsors are Datacolor, Lirico Group, SPGPrints, SGIA and Inédit.
Other speakers include:
Andres Alves, Co-founder, Tailored Industry
Apurba Banerjee, Chief Scientist, brrrº
Raj Bhakta, Co -founder, Funxion
Tony Chahine, CEO, Myant Inc
Shane Cooper, President, DeFeet International
Flint Davis, President, WeaveUp
Timothy Fahey, Director and Strategic Advisor, ACI Materials
Bill Grier, CEO, AM4U, Inc
Fiona Haran, Editor – Technical Textiles, WTiN
Danielle Hazen, Partner, LIRICO Group
Frank Henderson, CEO, Henderson Automation
Madison Maxey, CEO, Loomia
Mutlu Chaouch Orozco, Lead Analyst – Industry Digitalisation, WTiN
Kathy Phillips, VP of Design, Springs Creative
Suuchi Ramesh, CEO, Suuchi Inc
Mark Sawchak, Partner, Expand Systems
Mark Scrutton, Director- Print Technology and Strategy, Adobe
Karim Shafei, International Partner, Gherzi
Paul Willerton, Chief Sales Officer, DeFeet
Bruce Wright, Sales Manager, X-rite
WTiN managing director Mark Jarvis says: "We're grateful to receive the support of so many experts in all aspects of digitalization, many of whom have experience of implementing their own digital strategies in textile and apparel scenarios. The industry is just taking its first steps down this road, which will bring about profound change in products, production processes and business relationships. Everyone needs to understand its opportunities and risks."
"We're thrilled to welcome WTiN to Raleigh and Wilson College of Textiles," said Dr. Lisa Chapman, NC State University Faculty Scholar and digital technology and design expert. "State-of-the-art digital design tools can be used to improve the design workflow and bridge the communication gap between product development and the manufacturing process. WTiN's partnership event with the Wilson College of Textiles will provide an educational forum on the use of emerging digital technologies, to more broadly share information and encourage the use of new digital design processes."
