Ep. 48: Textile & apparel industry has ‘a lot to be excited about’ Ankit Podcast

This transcription has been AI generated and therefore may have some inaccuracies.

Ep. 48: Textile & apparel industry has ‘a lot to be excited about’

In this episode of The WTiN Podcast, we talk to Lutz Walter, director of Innovation and Skills at EURATEX.

Jessica Owen
Music, hello. My name is Jessica Owen, and I am the Deputy digital editor at WTIN, and this is the WTIN podcast, the fourth industrial revolution is underway, and the world of textile and apparel is just one industry that is benefiting from new and innovative technologies. With this in mind, for this series, I'll be talking to companies across the textile and apparel landscape about their new technologies, the benefits of digitalization, and the advice that they'd give to others who are trying to implement such solutions. This week, I am joined by Lutz Walter, who is the Director of Innovation and Skills at EURATEX. Lutz talks about how digitalization can help the industry recover from COVID 19, how startups could have a revolutionary impact and what the industry could look like in the future, considering micro factories, the Internet of Things, changing business models and more.

Well, good afternoon Lutz and a very warm welcome to the WTIN and podcast, how are you today?

Lutz Walter
I'm very well. Thank you, Jess. How are you?

Jessica Owen
Yes, I'm well. Thank you for asking. So I asked you on today's podcast so we can talk about EURATEX and your thoughts on digitalization within the textile and clothing industry. Now I assume that most people listening to this podcast. Have probably heard of EURATEX, but just in case they haven't. Do you mind just telling me about the organization and what you do? 

Lutz Walter
Exactly yes. So EURATEX is the European apparel and textile Confederation. It's an industry Confederation based in Brussels, in Belgium. We have been based here for, well, officially, probably 14 years, when EURATEX was created out of a merger of three preceding organizations. So the history actually goes back much longer than that. And I mean, the reason we're based in Buffalo's, obviously, is because of the European institutions being based here. So what we are basically, in essence, is the voice of the European apparel and textile industry. So our members are generally national textile and clothing industry federations from all over Europe, so and Europe in the larger sense. So we also have members from the UK. We have members from Switzerland. We have Turkish associations of members. So it's really the European industrial, also in the European economic space, that we represent. And we basically, yes, we represent the views and the interests of the textile and clothing industry. These are the mainly the European institutions, but also certain international organizations as well that may work on certain industry, policies, standards, etc,

Jessica Owen
right. Okay, interesting, so I understand that your role within the organization is Director of Innovation and Skills, and so do you mind just telling me more about this and what your role involves? 

Lutz Walter
Yes, so Well, I actually joined the organization good 20 years ago now, started in 1999 as A R and D manager of the organization, so dealing mostly with research policies and research programs, the European Union runs a fairly large public funding program for research. And so the idea was clearly that the textile sector should participate in that program and make sure that, let's say, receive its fair share from these public funds available for research and innovation. So that's basically how I started off. I also was involved in quite a number of European Research Program and projects themselves, and then after a an organizational transition back in 2017, 1819, I also took over the skills so education and training related policies, area which then also covers things like vocational education and Training, higher education for which there are also programs and policies on the year level that are relevant for the for the industry,

Jessica Owen
right? Okay, so you must know the industry inside out by the sounds of it.

Lutz Walter
Well, I mean 20 years is it seems to be a long time. And still, I when I look at the industry. It's, I mean, I'm learning something new every day, so it's really that, and that's really what is so fascinating about this industry, that is, there's so much, especially when you when you look at the the whole aspect of innovation and research and so on, that there's so much, there's so much going on in this industry and and it's so so wrongly seen by many people, and often also policy makers, as sort of a traditional industry and so on. But there's so much innovation. There's so much new stuff coming out of this industry, so much, so many new things you can do based on textile materials, using textile processes, combining textile materials with non textile materials, whether it be micro electronics or or composites or things like that, so that there's so much going on. So to say that I know it all, or anywhere near would be very presumptuous. But, yeah, I mean, over 20 years, you do see a lot of things that's true.

Jessica Owen
Well, I mean, I invited you here today to talk, um, well, to explore digitalization, I guess, within the industry specifically. So considering your job then, I mean, is there quite a lot going on in this space? Is there a lot to be excited about?

Lutz Walter
Oh, there's definitely a lot of a lot to be excited about. And I think there's also a lot going on so well, digital is something that nowadays everybody talks about. I think we have seen digitalization in this and other industries for many, many years, but I think we have seen whether related to to COVID, but probably also earlier, related to, let's say, the the very rapid increase of E commerce and digital platforms and these kind of things really a push into much further into digital domain. Obviously, the industry is sometimes probably rightly seen as a bit of a laggard in digital digitalization. Some of that, in my opinion, has to do with simply the the matter of the materials and the processes that we deal with so digitalizing a textile material, and let's say, digitally designing a textile material or textile product, is in a certain way, much more complicated, much more complex than, let's say, A rigid material, or simply a surface of something, and also the processes that we use are, in certain ways, so much more complex when you think about these complex mechanical and chemical processes that are used in the industry to make materials, to process materials to give materials very specific properties, and then all the way to the assembly, which obviously also that is an area where, in terms of automation, we we are considered sort of being way behind other sectors. But again, it has to do with the the matter of the product and the materials that we're dealing with. So in that sense, I think it's not an industry that lends itself too easily to let's say, if you want to say digitalization 1.0 but on the other side, there is a lot of digitalization that is coming towards that industry that is partially also driven by this industry. And there is a lot more coming in the coming months and years, that's for sure. So I mean, there are people who say, Well, we look at the future where everything that can be digitalized will be digitalized. And in a way, I agree with that, but only to the point of saying we will try to digitalize everything that can. We can digitalize when it makes economic sense, then to to do everything in a digital way remains to be seen. So, but I think there's a lot that can indeed, technically be digitalized in this industry, and we'll see a lot being digitalized in this industry. Whether all of that will, in the end, stick is a different question. I think a good example we've seen in the printing sector, where, which is, to me, one of the the, let's say, the lead processes in our industry, which have, which has seen really massive digitalization over the last few years. And when we looked at what happened there, and I can still remember years back when talking to people about digital printing, and the general feeling was, well, it may work for a bit of sampling work and a bit. Of, you know, really very specific sort of printing of flags and banners and stuff like that, which is kind of the non serious stuff, the non quality stuff, and the non really industrial stuff. How that has changed now, where people see, well, no, actually, it works for a lot of other things, because the technology is advancing so fast, and because the business models do change when the manufacturing processes change. So something that didn't make sense from a business model point of view with conventional printing, all of a sudden doesn't make sense when you use digital printing, and then that drives, again, the adoption of technology. So this interplay between technologies and business models, I think that's really where the where the digitalization is going to happen in our industry. So, and that is a constant, let's say, mutually reinforcing mechanism that people probably underestimate. In general, they look at a an established process through the lens of an established business model, and then it doesn't make sense to change a process, as long as you don't change the business model. But as soon as you you look at a technology from a different business model point of view, then it may actually make change to make sense to change the technology. So that's, that's, I think, where we see, we will see a lot of things and and, and where I'm also very excited about newcomers, total outsiders coming into our industry from maybe from the digital world, from the startup world, who do not come with all this sort of traditional baggage of things have always been like this. You make products like this, you sell products like this, and and with these sort of new way of looking at things, and new way of doing things, a lot of it will fail eventually, but, but that will drive development, and that will, in a way, also impact the more established, more traditional players. To say, well, if, if those newcomers can do it, or at least they seem to be able to do it, then we better try that as well. So I think that that's where a lot of sort of digital development will come to our sector, basically through outsiders, through people who who come with different ways of different business models and different ways of serving customers, serving, serving clients, etc.

Jessica Owen
It's interesting you say that. I remember being at my last year in Barcelona, and I think HP had a stand. Now, I only know of HP for laptops and printers. And then I was like, why are they here? And obviously they have an interest in inks and printing as you, as you say. So it's really interesting to see sort of that merge of industries these days. And I mean, you spoke there that essentially, if something's not broke, you shouldn't fix it. And so digitalization will have its place in some areas and it might not work out in others. But I think it's fair to say that, considering the COVID 19 pandemic, some people are trying to see whether digital technologies will work for them. So are you able to tell me, Well, I guess we should take a step back, really, and just have a look at how the industry has dealt with the pandemic. I mean, are you able to tell me about how it's been impacted by the by the virus?

Lutz Walter
Yeah, well, I mean, obviously there's no secret here that the this, the pandemic, has impacted the the industry severely, and and it's going, and it continues to impact the industry very severely. So there's, there's really no, no doubt about that. But then again, we have to think about, what are we talking about when we talk about the textile and the power industry? And you realize very quickly that this industry is, of course, very diversified. It's very makes so many different products serve so many different markets. And well, one of the markets that we serve are also, is the healthcare market. And well, yes, that part of the business has also been disrupted, but in a in a certain, very positive way. Having said that, obviously, the the bigger parts of the industry, especially, of course, anything related to clothing and fashion has been very severely hit. Has been severely hit by, I think this, this kind of double punch of disruption of the of the retail, of the retail environment, so closure. Of shops and difficulty of consumers to access the product in a way, and secondly, also the behavioral change. So as we all know, the more you work from home, the less you travel, the less you you have social events you have, you have less need for buying new things and that, obviously, this was really a double punch that hit the industry, clothing industry, very hard and and here we see an impact that is that will be also probably difficult to to recover in the in the short term, so, so on that side, we really have seen a very serious impact. And I think we haven't really seen the, let's say, the final fall out of it, because obviously, as all the sort of government measures kicked in to to protect jobs, to to enable these short term work schemes and all these things. So we haven't seen these restructurings and bankruptcies at large scale yet in the industry. But of course, everybody fears that this is what we what we're going to see in the in the coming months. So so that that part of the industry has been has been pretty hard hit on the other side, I think a lot of people compared to the to the 2008 2009 crisis, yeah, where we've seen a fairly traumatic lump in economic activity and industrial activity at the time. But interestingly, the sectors have been Otis. Let's say the the the sub sectors of the industry have been hit quite differently compared to today, compared to the crisis at the time, whereas at the time, the, for instance, the home textiles market was very hard hit. And also, for instance, the certain parts of the technical textile industry, anything related to construction work, geo textiles, these kind of things which were at the time, which was sort of where they had the housing crisis and everything was harder hit with the fashion industry. The clothing industry at the time, actually, consumer demand for clothing actually hardly moved during that time. I mean, it hardly slumped in any way, whereas nowadays it's a bit the reverse, because on the one side, yes, people buy less, less clothing and fashion because there's either less access to it or less need for it. But on the other in the other side is they spend more times in their houses, in their homes, and they try to make them more comfortable. So So home textiles are actually something that do work to some extent. Obviously, not all the again, also here different, because obviously, if your business, if you're serving the, let's say, the hotel and restaurant business, then definitely you're not doing very well these days. But yes, if you're in home decoration, it's actually working relatively well. If you look at the technical textile markets, again, we've seen differences, as I mentioned before. Anything health, health related, anything PPE related, has been doing pretty well, whereas, yes, automotive has struggled, definitely, and some other smaller markets sport has done, has done extremely well. So it's really, it's really sort of market by market, sector by sector, but overall, I mean, there's no there's no secret that. I mean, we're on the on the European level, industry as a whole. We're expecting somewhere around the 2020, ish percent in terms of drop in turnover for the industry, compared to 2019, which is, which is, which is fairly which is, which is really unseen. I think we had 13 in 29 so, so we are, yeah, we're almost almost double that drop that we had some 10 years ago. So that is pretty traumatic.

Jessica Owen
Yes, of course. So with all that in mind, then I know that eurotex has announced a proposal for recovery. Do you mind telling me more about this? Then I think it sort of has both short term and long term recovery goals. And a lot to do with that is this idea of digitalization and how it can help.

Lutz Walter
Well, obviously what we have announced, or what we have what we are talking about is the the European Union has adopted a fairly massive package, financial package for economic recovery in Europe. I. A in which we obviously hope and believe that the textile factor should, should benefit from that as well as interestingly, it has been singled out as one of 14 so called industrial ecosystems that that merit specific attention for these recovery measures, which was an interesting experience, because it came basically directly out of this realization early in the crisis to say, Well, we actually the textile sector that we considered sort of, well, a bit traditional, a bit of, sort of second priority, from a from a policy point of view, came into the spotlight early in the crisis, when all of a sudden we realized, well, we didn't have the capacity in Europe anymore to make these protective masks and other PPE at any scale and any in any sort of reasonable reaction time. And so policymakers realized, Okay, well, we this is an industry we can't just abandon, or we just leave it to other parts of the world. We need to do something to be to have a strategic supply and we have supply chains within Europe that that are resilient, that are that enable us to react quickly in in case of need so. So out of this realization came this idea to say, well, the textile and clothing sector is one of the sectors we should give priority in those recovery measures. So and these recovery measures are, in a way, divided into short and sort of more medium to long term measures. So on the short term front, clearly it's more about maintaining jobs, enabling companies to to stay open, to keep their staff, to keep their their competences, to to maintain the business in some way or shape. So so that is these are all the measures taken to support labor cost, also measures related to provision of short term loans, government loans and so on, to to keep the companies open so, so that's, that's This part where, mainly these things all usually work through the the the national level, whereas the money sometimes does come through Brussels, but it's it's all the measures are implemented on the national level, where our main focus was to say, well, let's make it work, and let's make it work quickly and non bureaucratically, so that actually, This aid actually arrives at the companies in the time when it's needed, so and so that is, let's say, really the short term, the short the short term part of it. And that's really something where, I think we also, as a as a European Association, to a certain extent, have only limited impact on this, because really, this is something that, as I said, happens a lot on the national level, whereas on the medium and long term, there's, there are a lot of opportunities that we believe we can realize, or we can only realize if we, if we do work together, if we, if we think really strategically about the future of this, of this sector in Europe and and here, digitalization does play a role. Also sustainability, the so called green and digital transition that that Europe wants to embark on is something that offers a lot of opportunities for for this industry, obviously, also a lot of technical and other business challenges, and that's where we are working with our members, with the the national associations and the industry, and with the European policy makers to to put something, to put some packages, some measures together that actually do make sense. So in in this area, we have recently announced a initiative called the recycling hubs, which should be investment in local or regional infrastructure for textile recycling, both pre and post consumer materials or waste, as we are going into we will have a situation in Europe where separate collection of textile waste will become mandatory as of 2025 across all EU member states, which means that waste volume, textile waste volumes, will go up significantly, and We need infrastructures to do something with this additional based volume, especially as we are expecting here, based volumes that are not of the easily reusable type. So this is not things that you can easily sort of cycle back into a second hand market, whether within Europe or. Or elsewhere. This is stuff that most likely needs material recycling. And for this, we don't have infrastructure right now. We don't have the the the supply chains, from the collection through the processing to the reprocessing and and re entry into the into the supply chains and the Textile Supply Chains existing in Europe. And that's what these recycling hubs should should try to do so a public investment, or a public private investment actually into some of these infrastructures, initially at pilot scale, so things where you can prove that yes, the technology, the recycling technologies, the separation or the the sorting, separation and recycling technology works for different types of waste with different compositions, different types of products and so on, and that you can then feed that back into Some industrial supply chain, ideally in Europe as well. So, so this is, this is one of the elements. The other element is clearly the whole area of of skills, where we see a massive need for investment, both by the industry itself, but also by by public authorities in terms of the education and training infrastructure. We look at an industry that has, on average, across across Europe, 35% of the working of the workforce age 50 and older. So that means that within the next 1215, years, 1/3 over a third of the industry workforce, will retire and and these are the people with the competences, with the experience, with the with the skills. They need to be replaced, at least to some extent, you may believe, as much as you want, into automation and digitalization, taking jobs away and all these kind of things. A lot of these jobs are not jobs that will be easily automated, and these jobs need to be replaced by people. And we we find it, or the industry finds it difficult to attract these people. And even if you attract young people into the sector, you will need education and training infrastructure, both in schools, but also in the companies themselves, that that are attractive, that that can actually make sure that the people acquire the right skills and also develop their careers in the textile industry. And that's where we want to to push, especially the the regional authorities, because that's where a lot of these regional and EU regional and structural funds are spent at the regional level, and where we want to convince regional development agencies, regional governments to invest into into Education and Training infrastructure for the for the industry, especially in areas where the industry is present, so in those manufacturing clusters for textiles and clothing that we have still in many countries in Europe.

Jessica Owen
And so you're talking about this as a medium to long term plan. I mean, can you put a figure on that? Are we talking five to 10 years? 10 to 20 years or no? 

Lutz Walter
I mean in terms of the the first example, the recycling hubs, is something that we want to see come together fairly quickly. As I said, the the textile waste volumes are going up already today and will be going up dramatically by 2025 so we need an infrastructure at the industrial scale available within basically the next five years. So we would like to see those recycling hubs, those pilot installations, really starting to be built within the next two, three years. So that's, that's the time frame that we look at in terms of the the education infrastructure again. So these European structural funds we look at now, the next seven years, basically where a really significant effort, or really significant budget is available for these kind of activities and and we hope that we see really modernization of of of textile schools, of of University of Technology Centers, of training centers. That's something that we really want to see happening really, basically, as of, as of next year. Because these are, as I say, they are. We have this, this big retirement wave and, well, I mean, educating people, bringing people into the industry, is a long term process. It's not something that you can do within a year or two. So, so we hope that some of these, these, these first investments, are actually starting as early as next year,

Jessica Owen
right? Okay, well, that'd be great if that does happen. And. Um, so, I mean, we've talked there about this proposal for recovery, and you've mentioned education, you also mentioned sustainability earlier, and I think COVID has also shown that we need to streamline supply chains and so on. And if we talk back again to digitalization, how that could possibly help. I mean, even if the technology is there, do you think people are willing to embrace the change, or do you think they're scared of it, or they might fall back into their old routines, or what? 

Lutz Walter
Well, I do believe people are to some extent, ready to embrace the digital change. Some of that is a is simply a question of generational change. So I think sometimes, if you, if you look at the industrial reality people, especially younger people, stepping into into it. They, they they experience such a such a total disconnect between what they use in their private lives and what they are asked to use in their professional life, in terms of technologies, in terms of communication tools, so companies that are using the fax machines to to send orders and things like that. I mean, that definitely is something that that will come to an end very, very quickly. So this, this whole idea that I digitalize a lot of things that I do in my private life, and there must be a way of doing that also in my professional life will be, I think, a very big underlying driver for for digitalization in general. The other thing that I mentioned already is the the concept of the sort of the digital startups. They come with different business models. They come also with different a different approach to obviously all these cloud based infrastructure allows you to to set up and scale much faster than you would do in a in a kind of traditional world. So you can a lot of your cost structure can be actually flexible. So rather than fixed which, which enables much faster which, which lowers barriers to entry and allows you to scale much faster according to to market demand. So, so that is something that, that, that I believe, we'll see happen again, the digital printing as a kind of a bridge hat, as sort of a bridgehead technology into digital manufacturing of textiles. So once you can digitally print, maybe you also try to digitalize processes before or after the printing. So this idea of having these digital micro factories for Textile and Fashion products, where you integrate, sort of the printing and then with the cutting and the assembly, and even if certain of these processes are not fully automated and digitalized, the fact that you can react very quickly, that you can quite efficiently produce small, small lots, small runs can be again, can can enable certain new technologies and enable new offers to the end market that that can then scale. So I believe that we will see a lot more digitalization across the entire, let's say process, from design all the way to manufacturing, and then up to the the end, the end consumer to the end customer. So so I see those there is really, there's a lot that will be there will be going on. The question is, then how much of that can be managed? How that how much of that can be gradual, and how much of that is effectively disruptive, where the established players are not able to make the jump because they have so much there's so much legacy systems, there's so much legacy investment, there's so much legacy knowledge and skills, that they find it very hard to to make that jump. I think an excellent example for me is this, this whole concept of omni channel retail, which in most cases, is basically an unwillingness to really make a more radical shift. You say, well, well, I, I have all my shops, and I somehow try to keep my my my shops, and still I want to add a digital channel and what. Get to is usually a solution that is sort of night official flash. It's really, it's, it's, it's really something hybrid that that is inefficient on both sides and cost, cost you extra, and create sort of conflicts within and with your your consumer. So there will be cases where, yes, in a certain way, we'll see the kind of the codecs and the Nokia of the of the Textile and Fashion business as well. That's for sure.

Jessica Owen
Gosh, well, I mean, so many of those things, like micro factories and that, they're also interesting. It'll be interesting to see what, what happens in the future with that. But I mean, another thing that I wanted to talk to you about today is I think eurotex has a project called define and this is like a collaborative project, and I think it's funded, or partly funded, by the European Commission's Cosme program. Now I've had a look on the website, and the project is working with some very cool and innovative companies. And you said that startups and newcomers are probably going to play quite an important part moving forward. So do you mind just telling me a bit more about the project and some of the companies within that that are quite promising and interesting? 

Lutz Walter
Yes. So the Define project indeed, as you say, it's, it's a, it's a co funded project by the European Union's Cosme. So the competitiveness, competitiveness and SME program, which funds this project. We run this project in a in a consortium with several organizations related to education, training in the fashion business. So we have the University of the Arts London, College of Fashion involved, Polytechnic Milano, which is the Project Coordinator. We have the French fashion Institute, EFM, or IFM relate, based in Paris, involved in it. So and the the project very much is a result of of these, this trend that I that I explained before, that we see more and more startups in this industry who come, not so much purely from the from the design and fashion side, which is something that we always had, but more from the from the technology side, from the digital side of things. So they, they, they work on new solutions for manufacturing, for the supply chain, for consumer interaction, for sales, obviously, as well for data, also working on so called Small textile products, where you integrate textiles and micro electronics for all sorts of smart functions in clothing or home textiles, for instance, or technical textiles. So there's a lot of new companies, people coming straight out of of University of colleges, who just want to hit it off by themselves and and the technology gives them the tools to do that. There's also quite a few who are sort of sailing on this sustainability Circular Economy trends, where they say, well, we find different ways of making, selling and recycling textile products. So basically, the program does, actually, is we run a it's a competition, basically for mentorship, so companies or startups that go through that program and are selected will then receive free mentoring, mentoring from from either experts of these institutions that are running this project that I mentioned before, or other sector experts that are being then paid through the program So they are become sort of free of charge for the for the startups and who help them in all sorts of domains, because the startups usually they they have maybe a cool technology, a cool concept, an interesting product innovation, but they lack access to clients, to the market. They may, they may obviously simply lack financial resources. They may lack information on standards, on whatever kind of material supply and so on. And that's where these mentors come in and help them to build sort of a complete offer and a complete structure and setup of their companies in order to to scale the solutions. A lot of that will will, in the end, fail, as the majority of startups in the end fail, but, but those who make it, they can really have quite a revolutionary impact on the industry. And we have really the interesting. Thing here is that we have startups from all over Europe. So the program funds any startup based in the greater European area, and we also try to bring them together with other startups or with business development partners from other countries, so that they can internationalize from day one, literally, and that's, I think, also where this the potential for digital actually lies, that you can reach customers, even as a very small company with clever digital marketing, you can reach customers all over the world. And so this that your potential to scale, or the critical mass that you actually need in order to reach profitable operation is much lower than in the past, because, well, as I said before, you can operationalize quite a few costs so you don't have such high upfront capex and and you can reach customers much more quickly than if you just open, you know, a small corner shop somewhere in your local town, and that that really, that has a big, big impact. 

Jessica Owen
Yeah, definitely. I mean, as you said there, you just listed some of the areas in which these startups are sort of innovating in, and it is very exciting. And there's some ideas there that just wouldn't have imagined, I think, a few years ago. So I think when companies trying to sort out a virtual fitting room, and I mean, in this COVID 19 world, that's sort of perfect so, and I mean, it's just such a great opportunity. And as you say, with digitalization, it just, it makes it so much easier for new ideas to, you know, come to fruition. It's, it's great. Um, now, well, unfortunately, we're running out of time, but I guess the final question that I'd like to ask you today is considering COVID 19 and the opportunity we have now to maybe sort of start again, in a way, and all these startups and their brilliant ideas and everything we've talked about today. I mean, what do you envision the future of the textile and clothing industry to be, say, within the next 20 or 1020, years? I mean, do you think it will change dramatically? 

Lutz Walter
Yes, I do believe it will change dramatically. I don't think the Well, first of all, I don't think there are many industries that will not change dramatically in the next 20 years. I think our societies will change dramatically in the 20 in the next 20 years. And I think digitalization will be a massive, a massive driver of this. So to me, there is, well, first of all, the interesting thing is, really thinking long term, is that I don't think textile products can be made obsolete anytime soon, whether we whether we will still be driving cars, or at least owning cars in 20 years, I wouldn't be. I wouldn't bet a lot of money on that, but I would bet a lot of money that we're still dressing ourselves in tax rather than 20 years. So in that sense, I think we have we look at a at a fairly resilient end market, and of course, also at a globally growing end market. For that matter, I think there's still, there's still a very big global population out there that would like to consume more textiles or consume better textiles than they consume today. So so there's still a big, big tailwind for this industry in terms of of end market demand. So that is, I think that's really good, and I think that that sets us apart from a few other industries where you don't have that visibility. So on the other side, I think the way textiles will be produced, the way textiles will be consumed, and the ways those global or local value chains will be set up will change very dramatically that I'm very certain of. So I believe we will. We will long term, I believe we will bring production and consumption closer together, both in space and in time. Anything that enables that, any technology that enables that, will be a winner, because it makes such so much sense. So it doesn't make sense to produce something in the on the other side of the world, 12 months in advance of when somebody may actually or may not buy it. It's just a total nonsense when you really look at it from first principles. And obviously we do it today because, well, that's what the technology allowed us to do or did not allow it to do. Two so and that that I think will change dramatically. So we will make textiles, textile products, much closer in time and space to where they are actually consumed, because then it also makes it much, much easier, much easier to establish the circular value chain. So the circular supply chains where you actually that used products go back into a process of, of re reprocessing, or re making. So that sort of materials circle in a in a local, or at least regional context. So, so that that, for me, it's, it's, I would say it's a given how exactly it will look like is, is certainly anybody, anybody's guess. The other thing that I that I also believe is a big driver, is the the what is called sort of ambient intelligence, or the internet of things. So I believe textiles are a very unique opportunity to bring intelligence very close to to our bodies, especially not only to our bodies, also into our, let's say, living environments, but let's, let's say especially to our bodies. So tech start as a second skin that can become a really smart skin. I think the sky's the limit. So I think we will see a lot of we will see a lot of failure, as we have seen in the past on smart textiles, but eventually we will see big, big, big successes, and whether these successes will be to the benefit of the textile industry in whatever way you want to define it, or whether we consider those then as, I don't know, consumer products, consumer health products, electronic products. Who knows? But I'm a firm believer that we will see this kind of, this fusion of of, let's say silicon and textile materials really becoming, becoming really large scale and becoming really everyday products in some way or shape. So I think for me, these are two very obvious examples in how and how textile consumption will or textile production will change. The textile products will change. The other thing that I also believe is that we will see a lot more using versus owning. So services in I, in my opinion, will be becoming a much part, a bigger part of our industry, we know that it's very well established in the professional markets when it comes to to work, wear uniforms, protective clothing, and these businesses that are in these rental laundry and so on, these are excellent businesses. They are very stable, they're very they're very profitable. They have good business models, and I think we'll see some of these models also coming to the consumer markets and and once you have these business models, you your focus or your your view on products also changes quite dramatically, because you really benefit from a high quality product that stays longer in circulation and or that simply more people are willing to use, but maybe not every day, the same person, but sort of different persons on different days. And that's, that's also something. And they, they're, they're interesting examples where some of these rental models have been at least explored on smaller scales, a few larger, more successful companies already in these markets, and they have found out that actually people rent different products than they buy. And it makes a lot of sense, and that also then have an have an impact on what kind of products you develop, how product how the products are being made and where they are made. So I think these, all these service models, I think again, there will be a big, big driver of of disruption in our industry in the in the coming 510, 20 years, for sure, definitely.

Jessica Owen
I mean, it's just all of these things are so interlinked. When you think it's easy to separate sustainability, digitalization, business models as separate entities, but they're all interlinked, and they're all going to be so important when we think about the future of the industry. But I mean, unfortunately, we're running out of time, but I think I could invite you on, and we could talk about, I don't know, a subject for a whole series on its own, an episode about each different area that you seem to have so much knowledge about. I mean, it's been brilliant to just, well, let you talk. I've barely asked you anything. It's just been fascinating. But, I mean, I just wanted to say thank you very much for coming on the show today. It's been a pleasure to talk with you.

Lutz Walter
No, I mean, very happy to be here, and thanks for. Invitation, as I said, in 20 years, well, I've seen a few things, but I wouldn't say that. I've seen it all. And I'm, I'm really looking forward to the next 20 years, because I'm sure they will not, there will be nothing like the last 20 and I'm really, I'm really excited about that, but happy to share some of my ideas here. And well, by not doing a sequel of this and talk again, maybe on some more specific subject, would be my pleasure.

Jessica Owen
Definitely.