2. Summary of data results from the Survey

2.34. Conclusions

63% of the companies are from Clothing/fashion and from Technical Textiles and invest at least 4% of their budget in innovation. Most of the companies prefer younger managers and engineers. This is particularly relevant in Portugal and Belgium, where about 90% of the companies prefer people under 40 years old. On the other hand companies prefer to recruit younger technical workers (less than 30 years old).

Concerning innovation, all areas of innovation are mentioned, but technology and design are the top rated answers. Data Capture is especially relevant for Belgium companies, in line with the evolution of smart textiles for health and sport that require large amounts of data to be analyzed. Besides in what concerns technical textiles, all areas are relevant, with emphasis on clothtech (16%), protech (13%), sportech (11%), mobiltech (11%) and medtech (10%).

In terms of product development in Clothing, there is a special interest on jackets and trousers. Concerning Home Textiles, there is an emphasis on bed linen, particularly pillowcases.

More than half of the companies have either no involvement or involvement only in first generation smart textiles.

First generation: functional smart textiles - all effects are mentioned, with emphasis on water and stain resistant, as well as conductive thermic / electric.

Second generation: passive smart textiles reacting to the environment - All effects are mentioned, with emphasis on thermal aspects (thermally regulated, heat involving and heat fabric and storage). Colour change fabrics have been highly rated in Slovenia and in Portugal.

Third generation: smart textiles with attached or embedded components - All effects are mentioned, with emphasis on temperature regulating. Activity reading and heart beat reading are given significant importance in Belgium and Slovenia, in line with the focus on sportech and medtech.

Fourth generation: Ultra smart textiles, much more advanced, combine sensors, actuators, and communication, help anticipating needs of the wearer - Interactive wear and sport jackets.