Managing Director, MACPI South Asia showcasing their versatile machineries
Asia is the largest contributor to global garment exports, and India accounting for a significant share, mandates MACPI, a well-known Italian company for its pressing, finishing and cutting solutions to capturing a bigger share of the market. Stefano Bordogna, Managing Director, MACPI South Asia is a happy man today, “Earlier Delhi was on the top, but in the past few years, Bangalore has picked up and is now the major hub for manufacturing formal shirts, suits and jackets,” he said. With the structural and fire safety issues in Bangladesh taking centre stage, European buyers are hesitant to source from the country and if anyone is gaining, it is definitely India, he opines. “Exporters have always been good for us, but it is encouraging to see the domestic market gaining momentum with new players coming in. Madura, Blackberrys and United Exim are some of our key clients,” shares Stefano.
Stefano also shares that ‘formal’ is going out of trend and more of casual jackets and shirts are being preferred these days, so customers are calling for machines that are versatile enough for the change in styles. To consistently develop machines that suit the changing requirements of the garment manufacturers, MACPI has tie-ups with Hugo Boss for shirts, and Diesel for denims. “Our clients are themselves the pioneers of these machines. These brands present us new designs and pose us the challenge of developing machines specific to their needs. This helps us make machines that are more cost-effective as well as best-suited to the customer’s end use,” says Stefano. He asserts that even the jeans market is doing pretty well.
Stefano firmly believes that unlike other Asian garment manufacturing countries like Cambodia, Bangladesh and China, India has a very flexible setup to offer a diverse product basket that attracts the foreign buyers to source from the country. But with the increasing costs of transportations, delayed communications, and the need to setup buying offices far from homeland, Europe and USA have now started their own production, in small quantities though. “Europe did account for 7-8 per cent of the company’s market share, but with US having just started producing in very small quantities (rather samples) their share is presently not taken into account.” He stresses on the fact that Asia will always be the growth driver for MACPI. “With the level of satisfaction that the group provides to its customers by delivering highly efficient machineries and excellent sales service, the already existing customers keep coming back to us for newer products. And with the new players also emerging, we now expect remarkable growth in the apparel market,” concluded Stefano.
