The document discusses the rise of polyester as the dominant fiber in functional and sportswear due to its engineered properties that offer comfort and moisture management, surpassing cotton and natural fibers. It highlights significant advancements in polyester technology and production, forecasting increased market share for polyester by 2020 and 2030. The author stresses the need for Indian manufacturers to recognize polyester's potential, while also acknowledging environmental concerns regarding its sustainability.

1. MY VIEWPOINT
76 The Indian Textile Journal | July 2017
W
hen did you last see an athlete, a tennis
player, a football or a cricket player
changing the jersey in the midfield? You
may not even remember now though it
was a very common scene until the 90s. They keep on
playing for hours comfortably now. And the secret lies in
their specially engineered functional wear made of
modified polyester that never clings to the body, keeps
them dry and comfortable throughout the day – unlike
cotton jersey that has a definite limit in sweat absorbing.
The wonder filament—Microfil Polyester Yarn—had thus
revolutionised the functional wear segment first, paving
way for its ascendance to the top slot among all fibres.
World fibre production is expected to reach a new
high in the Year 2017 – a phenomenal output of
100 million metric tonne with an estimated per capita
consumption of 12-13 kg. More than 50 per cent of this
will be in polyester – both filament and staple fibre put
together. Polyester has already surpassed cotton
consumption and rightfully earned the title of King of
Fibres – in just 50 years after its invention and patenting.
The success story of polyester as an apparel fibre
started way back in Japan in the 80s. Until then it was
considered to be a cheap fibre with undesirable sheen,
plastic touch providing little or poor comfort rather
irritable to the wearer.
A garment is supposed to provide three basic comforts
namely, tactile or touch comfort, pressure comfort and
thermal-wet comfort. Among these, thermal-wet comfort,
good absorption with easy or quick-drying is the primary
requirement. In functional wear this is considered to be
more important than just its aesthetic properties.
Functional comfort is determined by factors such as
proper moderation in stretch, smooth conformation to
body movement and sufficient hygroscopic and heat
retaining properties. A typical sportswear garment
would take care of the functions of a given end-use.
For example, the garment meant for cycle-racing, should
not create drag or be too bulky; or the garment meant
for athletics or for aerobics should not unduly restrict
the body movement. At the same time it should be easy
to launder. These aspects were engineered into polyester
by modifying the cross section and making the fibre very
fine as well – drawing ultra fine denier to the level of
0.3 DPF (Denier Per Filament). Once this was done, major
sportswear brands started launching polyester jerseys
with moisture management tag. This pioneering research
was adopted and successfully applied by sportswear
brands like Nike, Puma, Reebok, Adidas and others.
Athletic and sports specific apparels were developed and
launched soon that became a rage later.
For the hottest Olympics ever, in Athens, Greece, in
2004, Adidas created its Climacool Olympic Apparel
Technology engineered to keep an athlete’s body at the
optimal body temperature at all times, regardless of the
heat. Assisted technically by Dr George Havenith of
Loughborough Sports University in UK, they studied
human thermal physiology or how the people react to
heat stress. Body maps for both male and female athletes
were created to precisely identify where the human body
Micro Filament Yarn
Microscopic (cross sectional) view of Moisture
Wickable Polyester Yarn
Micro filament is less than one denier per filament. For example, 75d/72f
means 1 DPF and 75d/144f is 0.5 DPF or simply put 9 KM weighing
0.5 grams.

2. www.indiantextilejournal.com
The Indian Textile Journal | July 2017 77
produces sweat at different exercise levels in different
climatic conditions as well as considering different
athlete types, body types, genders and age. Based on
this research, they applied moisture wicking fabrics,
conductive fibres consisting of silver coated yarns and
three dimensionally structured fabrics to key heat and
sweat zones.
Despite the recognition of such superior properties
from a functional point of view, polyester fibre still lacked
the most delicate of senses – Intimacy.
Why can’t synthetic fibre achieve an intimate feeling
when compared to natural fibre! This question bugged
the researchers for a long time since the launch of
polyester in a big way in performance wear. The
challenge remained in providing a natural touch to the
polyester fibre to cater widely across various apparel
segments, to meet the ever growing demand. The
Japanese textile industry had collectively taken this task
and they found out that the uneven surface bestows any
natural fibre with a high degree of irregularity which in
turn contributes to wearing comfort and a feeling of
consistent attractiveness.
For example, the thin threads of silk that are reeled off
of cocoons are not all alike in thickness. Moreover due to
the curvature in their lengthwise direction, the physical
properties of these thin threads differ from one length to
another. This complicated yet irregular difference in
thickness provides silk its universal appeal.
On the contrary, the extreme uniformity had accorded
polyester no help at all initially on the aspect of intimate
feel. Working on this specifically, the research teams in
Japanese polyester industry turned their efforts towards
bringing in those natural fibre properties that would
truly prove compatible with the specific fields of apparel.
Shin-Gosen is the ultimate microfilament range of
polyester yarns thus developed to replace the natural
fibre segment starting from silk were launched by the
Japanese companies – Teijin, Toray, Toyobo, Kanebo,
Asahi, Kuraray and Unitika, to name a few. Eventually, it
overtook natural fibres by certain distinctive qualities
that could be called all its own.
With the launch of Shin-Gosen range of modified
polyester filament yarns, the natural fibre segments
started getting phased out one by one. With the launch
of differential or bi-shrinkage yarns first, the silk apparels
switched over to polyester; with textured woolly yarns,
the wool industry took the beating; linen look ThicknThin
yarns provided the best alternative and with the launch
of cool touch cottony polyester yarns that are completely
delustered, it started getting into the traditional cotton
segment also. From then on, polyester became a truly
universal fibre not only for functional wear but also in
other sartorial applications and home furnishings. Just a
few interesting cases for example, the traditional Middle
Eastern ethnic-wear products—Thoube, Abhaya, Veils
and Chaddor, etc.—are fully taken over by polyester
fabrics now mainly catered by Southeast Asian countries.
The Indian ethnic-wear products like saree and churidar
market is dominated by Surat polyester suppliers.
World fibre consumption
– Since 1950s in million metric tonne with forecast for 2017
World fibre output – 2016
Synthetic fibers 62.7%
Cotton 24.3%
Regenerated Cellulose fibers 6.6%
Wool 1.1%
Other natural fibers 5.3%
Global fiber output in 2016 by type of fiber in percent.
Basis - 99 mln tons.
Source: Lenzing group’s Fiber Year 2016
When I was still an athlete I has plenty of
opportunities to wear some first class international
brands in different competitions. Since then,
I wished that I could wear a Chinese brand in
the future. After leaving the
professional competition,
I established Li-Ning company.
People began to recognise
Li-Ning brand since the 1992
Olympic Games, when Chinese
athletes appeared in the
awarding ceremonies
wearing clothes of a
Chinese sports brand for
the first time.

3. MY VIEWPOINT
78 The Indian Textile Journal | July 2017
In home furnishings too polyester has started replacing
other fibres first owing to its superior abrasion resistance in
the upholstery segment, inherent flame retardant property
added with easy launderable quality providing the best
option for curtains and table cloths and lightweight,
stain-free, anti-bacterial finished polar fleece as an ideal
blanket fabric for hotels, airlines and travel industry.
No wonder the most dominant fibre of all is polyester now.
Let us see some interesting facts and statistics.
The man-made fibre industry started the first
commercial production of artificial silk using cellulosics by
De Chardonnet in France in 1892. Regrettably the business
declared bankruptcy in 1894! However, not to be
discouraged, the industry continued to develop other
cellulosics and acetates until the arrival of nylon, which
was discovered by Wallace Carothers at DuPont in the
1930s. His discovery brought the first truly MMF to the
market. Initial applications of this yarn were mostly in
military uses during World War II and in replacing silk in
women’s hosiery to some extent. Nylon was followed by
the ICI development of polyester, discovered in the early
1940s by two British scientists working for Calico Printers.
Polyester was invented and patented by these British
Scientists – JR Whinfield, JT Dickson, WK Birtwhistle, and
CG Ritchie in 1941. They created the first polyester fibre
called terylene. In 1946, DuPont bought all legal rights
from the Brits and came up with their own polyester
fibre, which they named dacron. Polyester was first
introduced to the Americans in 1951. It was advertised
as a miracle fibre that could be worn for two months
straight without ironing and still look presentable. Yet, it
had never appealed to the general public for another
40 years. And it became popular as a major apparel fibre
only after the introduction of modified micro fibre that
could simulate the effect of natural fibres.
From these humble beginnings, in 1980, polyester
demand rose to 5.2 million tonne (mt) globally and by
2000, it had reached 19.2 mt. In 2014, demand was put at
46.1 mt. The message is clear that polyester has gained
significant share from all other fibres, both man-made
and natural, and that anyone in the fibre business has to
be aware that polyester producers are constantly looking
at other fibres and their markets to determine if polyester
can take further market share.
Graphs show the history of fibre demand in millions
of tonnes, and demonstrates the dominant role that
polyester has had in fibre demand growth. The graph
also shows the continuing dominance of polyester going
forward, as calculated by England-based PCI fibres in its
forecast. Polyester demand passed that of cotton in 2002,
and has continued to grow at a significantly faster rate
than all other fibre types. A very large part of the growth
in polyester has come from China with India and
Southeast Asia also contributing. In the case of China,
both polyester production and apparent domestic
demand for the fibre have been very strong. China
accounts for 69 per cent of all polyester fibre production
Popular trends in
polyester-based
activewear
100 % Polyester with Moisture Management
(Wickability) through Yarn or finish - by default.
UV protective finish and Anti Microbial finish
– optional
Mainly Circular Knit & Warp Knit for trim fabrics
Light weight: Around 140 GSM
Engineered fit for maximum thermal-wet
comfort.
Heart rate and Speed / Distance monitoring
using Wear link technology in garments.
T-shirts with i-Pod controls and gloves with
integrated MP3 players.
Gore-Tex comfort mapping technology for
optimal freedom, Dry-Fit and extreme
breathability.
Nike Sphere React Technology using Teijin’s
self-regulating fiber. The fabric - in getting wet
– changes from flat surface to three dimensional
structure to reduce cling to the body quite
effectively.
Solar powered clothing developed by Hohenstein
Institutes, Stuttgart, Germany.
Model of stress
in ring spinning
Verification with
PET (cost)
Testing of
degradation
Adaption of PLA
formulation
Least
degradation
PLA Benchmark SPEY results
Demonstrator and
testing of tenacity
and abrasion,
bench mark:
standard bed linen
Ring spinning
trials with
standard PLA
degradation
4x
fit
No fit
Ring spinning
trials with SPEY
PLA
PLA formulation
with highest ring
spinning
productivitty
1970 1980 1990 2000 2009 2016
Polyester 34% 47% 53% 66% 79% 85%
Polyamide 40% 30% 24% 14% 9% 7%
Acrylics 21% 19% 14% 9% 5% 3%
Others 5% 4% 9% 11% 7% 5%

4. globally, and if India and Southeast Asia are added, these
three regions represent 86 per cent of global production.
As we know, in India, it is cotton that still dominates
the fibre basket with a share of over 50 per cent, and
polyester enjoying a share of over 40 per cent. However,
according to polyester pundits, this trend is expected to
change over the next five years. By 2020, the share of
polyester fibre in total mill consumption is expected to be
around 46 per cent, while that of cotton at 43 per cent.
This is expected to increase to 53 per cent by 2030, and
cotton share could be down to 32 per cent.
With cultivable land shrinking across the world on
one side and exploding global population on another
side, the growing demand of raw material for the
clothing and furnishing industry could be met only with
polyester now. It is time for Indian manufactures and
brands to take note of this phenomenal potential
available for polyester products not only in the functional
wear but also in other segments indicated in this article.
And it is also time for us to launch our own Indian brands
like Li-Ning did in China.
The author, PN Kumar is General Manager of
Zenith Textiles, a unit of Zenith Exports Ltd,
located at Nanjangud Industrial Area, Nanjangud,
Karnataka. The author dedicates this article to his
mentor Bpk.Marimuthu Sinivasan of Indonesia,
the Founder President of PT Texmaco Jaya and
Polysindo Group of Companies.
This article is published from the author’s web
page with his approval.
The author, though being a polyester proponent himself, would like
to share a note of concern: Polyester is certainly not an eco-friendly
fibre and in the long run, excessive consumption of PET products
could lead to ecological disaster. Yet, polyester recycling is also
coming up in a big way and in India too there are already a few
companies that have successfully started PET bottle-based recycling
plants. Whatever the remnant that is not fit for recycling should be
used for laying roads and also for building material in future.
Production energy consumption in MJ/kg
Production greenhouse gas in CO2eg./kg
100.00
4.00
80.00
3.00
60.00
2.00
40.00
1.00
20.00
PLA
PLA
PLA
PLA
PES
PES
PES
PES
0.00
0.00
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