Tèxtils.CAT organized a successful cluster mission to Australia
Tèxtils.CAT the Catalan Cluster of Advanced Textile Materials, led a cluster mission to Australia from November 4th to 8th 2024, as part of EuroBoosTex project.
This mission brought together three of the clusters in the project: Tèxtils.CAT, NTT and Techtera with the goal of exploring opportunities and synergies for their members in key Australian areas: Sydney, Canberra, and Melbourne.
During the mission, Tèxtils.CAT discovered the textile innovation ecosystem with visits to industry such as The Woolmark Company (focused on wool innovation), The Schneider Group (Australia’s premier wool auctions), Authentico (brand of traceable supply chain) and Samsara Eco focused on enzymatic recycling of polyester and nylon; to technology providers and universities like: University of Technology Sydney, CSIRO (Australia leading scientific research organization), RMIT University’s School of Fashion and Textiles, the Deaken University, and the Institute of Frontier Materials.
The mission also included several inter-cluster meetings with the Climate Change Cluster (C3) and the Advanced Fiber Cluster Geelong where Tèxtils.CAT presented the cluster and the EuroBoosTex partnership.
In the coming months, 15 SMEs selected through the 3rd EuroBoosTex call on Internationalization, including six Tèxtils.CAT members, will head to Australia to participate in various activities, exhibitions, and meetings. These efforts aim to enhance networking, knowledge exchange, and expansion into the Australian textile market.
Tèxtils.CAT rated the mission as highly successful, enabling valuable contacts and exploration of opportunities in Australia’s textile innovation ecosystem.
Internationalization is a key area of the cluster strategy addressing two major objectives: increasing the competitiveness of its members with facilitated access to third country markets and the increased visibility of the members at international level thanks to the cluster participation in key events, both in Europe and internationally.
Collaborations undertaken in EuroBoosTex project support these activities to reinforce the links with Australian stakeholders and opening new potential collaborations. Internationalization projects run by Tèxtils.CAT aim to support textile SMEs in identifying and exploiting growth opportunities worldwide through activities such as partnering missions, matchmaking events, cross-partnership webinars, circular economy business models, digitalization driver and cross-cultural approach, and lessons in building industrial resilience.
About EuroBoosTex
EuroBoosTex aims to drive change and make European textile value chains more resilient after the pandemic, providing SMEs with tools to improve their innovation potential, technological uptake, skills, and internationalization. EuroBoosTEX launched over the past 2 years a set of calls with 1.05M€ to support innovation, to adopt processes and technologies through strategic collaborations, and for Going international to Australia with vouchers of 12k€ to support market access, contacts with local providers, and cover travel costs.
EuroBoosTEX is funded under the SMP Program and brings together five clusters: Tèxtils.CAT from Catalonia (Spain), ATEVAL from Valencia (Spain), NTT (Italy), CITEVE (Portugal), and Techtera (France).
Tèxtils.CAT and its members’ testimonial: https://youtu.be/-C73fwr8GdE