The company offers a wide range of products apart from its strong presence in the textile industry, for household sanitation & homecare, mining, water treatment, leather, construction, paint, adhesives, and agrochemicals segments.
Fineotex Chemical Limited (FCL) is one of the leading specialty chemical manufacturers catering to many other sectors. The company, which has made deep inroads into the textile industry, is all set to make a splash at ITMA 2023 to be held in June in Milan, Italy. In an exclusive chat, Executive Director Aarti Jhunjhunwala spoke at length about the company’s recent performance, its product range, participation in ITMA 2023 and sustainability initiatives, among others.
For FCL, 2022 had been a significant year as it marked by many milestones and achievements. A couple of key highlights include:
- FCL has expanded its capacity at Ambernath to 104,000 tonnes per year, enabling it to fulfil new product contracts and expected future orders.
- The company is celebrating 11 years of listing on the Indian stock market and has received numerous accolades, including certification as a ‘Great Place to Work’, being included in the Nifty Micro-Cap index, entering the ‘A’ group category of listed companies, receiving certification from the US EPA and being honoured with the Women at Work Leadership Award, demonstrating its commitment to excellence and growth.
Expanding Portfolio
Currently the company offers a wide product range for the global market. Listing them down, Aarti Jhunjhunwala, said, “FCL has a wide range of segments covering over 470 product categories. Our recent tie-up with Health Guard Australia and Euro Dye CTC Belgium has enriched our product offerings and delighted the customers once again with the latest technology and need-of-the-hour products. This demonstrates the company’s commitment to providing comprehensive and innovative solutions for various needs in these markets. Our bespoke specially developed silicone functional range imparting epoxy, hydrophilic, colour enhancement finishes are already the talk of the industry with huge validation from many of the top companies.”
Global Presence
Going into details regarding the key global markets where the company enjoys a strong presence, Aarti Jhunjhunwala stated: “FCL’s reach extends far and wide with a global presence in approximately 70 countries, including Brazil, Bangladesh, Germany, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Syria, Thailand, the USA, Venezuela and Vietnam. The company has established a strong network of over 110 dealers in both the Indian and international markets, showcasing its commitment to providing excellent products and services to customers worldwide. Exports account for 25% cent of our income.”
“This wide network is a testament to our strong reputation and ability to deliver quality solutions to customers around the world,” she added. When asked to highlight some of the company’s recent innovations in technology and new products, Jhunjhunwala mentioned that the company had entered into two strategic joint ventures since 2021. “We have tied up with Health Guard Australia which is one of the leading speciality chemical producers with major product focus on anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-odour, anti-mosquito and anti-bug bite, and of protection base specialty finishing for textiles which are very important for the new trends in textiles,” she informed.
“FCL is the global marketing channel of Health Guard Australia. This is a viable partnership and we are present in almost 70 countries where we are also marketing the entire range of Health Guard speciality and thus expecting a great order line-up considering future market growth in 2023-2024,” Jhunjhunwala said. “The other venture is with Euro Dye CTC, which is a speciality chemical producer from Europe and has recently bought over the Unilever plant in Belgium and also taken over the business of Stephenson UK for the wool speciality chemicals,” she further said.
All Geared Up
The company is all geared up for participating in ITMA, Milan, later this year. Throwing light on the preparations for this mega textile trade fair, Jhunjhunwala said, “FCL and BIOTEX will participate in ITMA, Milan, which will help us to be at a global event showcasing our capability, competency and innovative product range to all global customers. We will also address all technical queries at customer’s end with our technical experts. We will be happy to see all customers together in Milan and will concentrate on the promotion of our new sustainable product line as mentioned above.”
Sustainability Focus
Sustainability is probably the most used word in textile manufacturing these days. How does FCL ensure that its products and technologies adhere to the norms of sustainable manufacturing? Responding to this question, Jhunjhunwala remarked, “Sustainability is very much an important aspect now in the space of textile chemicals across the world. With a top-down approach from brands, all production factories are now keen to develop sustainable processes in their day-to-day production, thus replacing hazardous chemicals with certified product lines complying with RSL, MRSL and PRSL norms of brands. We have all-round certification to comply with such customers’ demands.”
“We are committed to promoting sustainability in our operations and products. The company takes several steps to ensure that its products and technologies promote a clean environment and are free from harmful substances. This includes adhering to the requirements set forth by statutory authorities, developing processes and products that are non-hazardous and free from harmful substances, treating and safely discharging wastewater through effluent treatment plants (ETPs) and a combined effluent treatment plant (CETP) to prevent water pollution and aiming to reduce overall water and energy consumption to increase efficiency, reduce costs and promote sustainability. We are also adopting processes to reduce air and water pollution, reduce waste from process and packaging and transport-related pollution,” she added.
“Further, we are working towards developing chemistry that reduces process time and energy, reduces water usage and minimises hazardous waste output. We have successfully reduced the use of inorganic chemicals in the environment to minimise load in the effluent treatment plants. Overall, FCL is consciously and constantly adopting sustainability in its operations and products with a focus on reducing environmental impact and promoting better sustainability practices in the textile value chain,” Jhunjhunwala further stated. Highlighting some of the key reasons which give the company a competitive edge, she stated, “We are concentrating on new generation chemistry which will save power, energy and process time of the existing production line.”
“This will create less hazardous disposal in ETP with sustainable chemistry and overall reduction on COD, BOD, TDS and TSS in existing ETP by reduction of hazardous chemistry. Also, we are considering highly concentrated chemicals with easier handling so that our customer can save freight cost and transport emission can be reduced drastically with less wastage of packaging material. A few of our products are ‘blue sign’ registered and the remaining have been approved by Eco Passport. So, we are considering ZDHC Level 3 gateway for future chemicals which we are producing and marketing globally. Our central research and development centre with state-of-the-art facility is in SASMIRA, Mumbai. The overall focus is on giving all our products the tag of sustainability because we care for the planet,” she added.
Optimistic Outlook
Sharing her expectations for 2023 on the growth of the global textile industry, an optimistic Jhunjhunwala commented: “The global textile market stood at around USD 1,002.4 billion in 2020. Given all the challenges that the industry had to surmount over the past two years, it still managed to grow around 3.5%. The market is further expected to grow at a CAGR of 4.5% during the period 2023-28. Expected global market value will be around USD 1,305.4 billion by 2026. The textile industry in Asia Pacific is expected to witness significant growth owing to the thriving fashion and clothing industry in countries like India, China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam, among others.”
“Over the forecast period, the growing trade agreements between various countries to support the textile sector are likely to aid the market in the region. For instance, in India, 100% foreign direct investment (FDI) is allowed in the textile sector. Further, the market is expected to be augmented by the growing demand for medical textiles, especially after the pandemic. In short, if the geopolitical situation across the world remains stable and there are no more outbreaks such as the corona virus pandemic, the sector will definitely post growth in the coming years. What is required now is more innovation and a deep commitment to sustainability to take the sector forward,” she added.