By Charlie Lunan
W. L. Gore & Associates Inc. (Gore) has authorized an outside company to manufacture certain laminated Gore-Tex fabrics for the first time in history.
Under the agreement, Formosa Taffeta Co. Ltd. (FTC) of Taiwan will become the exclusive dual source for selected laminated Gore-Tex fabrics starting in the fourth quarter. In addition to freeing up Gore resources for product development, the arrangement will expand availability of technical fabrics used by many outdoor apparel and footwear brands.
“We have successfully worked with FTC for more than 10 years,” said Mike McCollam, global divisional leader for Gore Fabrics. “This extension of our partnership with FTC, a prominent textile manufacturer, will enable Gore’s Consumer Fabrics business to streamline its operations without compromising our quality, and also enables Gore Fabrics to focus even more on product innovation.”
Gore revealed the agreement August 30, when McCollam joined FTC General Manager Shih-Ming Hsei to celebrate the opening of a new factory in Douliu, Taiwan that will manufacture the laminated fabrics. The companies spent the last year retrofitting the 32,300-square-foot factory with Gore production equipment.
The project was set in motion a few years ago, when Gore executives considered how changes in the global textile market would challenge their existing model, which calls for tight control of manufacturing to ensure quality. Gore chose Formosa Taffeta because it had proven its reliability over more than 10 years as a supplier of base fabrics. Gore code named the venture “Project Bumblebee” after the yellow-and-black robot in the Transformers movies that quickly transforms into new objects to adapt to situations.
Formosa Taffeta said the partnership marks a new era of collaboration between Taiwan’s textile manufacturers and large international manufacturers that will help the country move up the textile value chain.
Photo courtesy Gore-Tex
