Textile companies in Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province put on IT wings

Development of IT-integrated new products such as Youngdo Velvet and Samwoo Enterprises is in full swing

Youngdo Velvet (CEO Lee Chung-ryeol), which has been producing short, soft and fluffy velvet fibers for 53 years, has transformed fibers into high value-added IT materials. Velvet fibers are used for clothing, bags, shoes, and car seats. Since 2003, the company has decided to apply IT to textile technology as a future food business and has been working on research and development. In the meantime, 10 billion won was invested to localize Loving Po for liquid crystal display (LCD) in 2008.

Rubbing cloth for LCD is used in the process of forming an alignment film that constantly adjusts the direction of liquid crystal during the LCD process.

This product is supplied to Apple and applied to the iPad. CEO Lee Choong-ryeol said, “This year, sales in this field will reach 40 billion won, an increase of 5 billion won from last year.”
 

Samwoo Enterprises (CEO Kim Joon-hyeon) in Dalseong-gun, Daegu supplied high-pressure gas storage containers mounted on the Naro-ho 2-stage rocket. In order to increase the strength of the aluminum storage container, a fiber-reinforced composite material (FRCM) was developed in the form of a yarn with a thickness of 0.5 mm and tightly wound on the surface of the container.

A company official introduced, "The high-pressure gas storage container can be used for natural gas city buses and fuel cell vehicles."

Ilsim Global (CEO Ryu Man-hyeon), which produces cleaning fibers using microfibers, recently introduced an intelligent window cleaning robot that cleans windows while moving on its own. A company official said, "Since its launch, we have sold 1,700 units and received more than 4,000 orders." The Korea Institute of Fashion Industry is also actively conducting research and development to strengthen the competitiveness of the textile industry. The researcher is developing smart textiles that have the function of transmitting the body condition of a person wearing clothes to an external device by applying an electronic circuit to the textile.

Woo Jeong-gu, head of the Korea Fashion Industry Research Institute, said, “If textiles in the Daegu and Gyeongbuk regions utilize their past infrastructure strengths and develop high value-added products incorporating IT, they will become the next-generation growth engine for the region.”
 

Daegu = Reporter Kim Deok-yong kimdy@hankyung.com