INTIMATEWEAR | Q & A Vendor Talk | Hela Clothing
QUALITY IS EMBEDDED IN OUR PRODUCTION PROCESS
A $ 200 million company focusing on apparel manufacturing, design and innovation, Hela Clothing is headquartered in Sri Lanka and has 12 factories in four countries— one each in Kenya, Ethiopia and Mexico and the remaining in Sri Lanka. Providing design-to-deliver solutions in the intimate, sleep and casual wear product ranges, its two main clusters Hela Intimates and Hela Casual produce intimatewear, activewear, casualwear and kidswear. BUDDHI PARANAMANA, General Manager— Innovation and Strategy, talks about technological innovation in innerwear.
What is the global market size of intimates and casuals? How do you see your market segment growing in the next few years locally and globally? The market size of the global apparel industry is estimated to be $ 1.4 trillion by the end of 2021 based on reports published by the World Bank and Euromonitor.
High-value products such as sports and intimatewear are among the fastest growing segments in the apparel market. Where the CAGR of all segments in the apparel industry averages at 4.5 per cent, the CAGR of the intimates segment will be around 5 per cent over the next three years.
Buddhi Paranamana, General Manager, Innovation and Strategy, Hela Clothing
What are the growth prospects of the global product lifecycle management in the apparel market for 2018- 2022? With the increasing demand of‘ speed to market’, brands are challenging vendors to improve their product lifecycle management. There has been an increase in third party service providers catering to provide product lifecycle management tools. The future of such tools will include artificial intelligence to streamline supply and demand in a better way.
72 | FIBRE2FASHION JUNE 2018