Fibertex Nonwovens has acquired the nonwoven business of  Turkish manufacturer Ribatek, adding to its global footprint which already included sites in Denmark, France, the Czech Republic, the U.S. and South Africa and providing it with additional spunlacing technology.

"We are very pleased now to have reached an agreement with the owners of Ribatek about the acquisition of the company’s spunlacing activities. We have cooperated with Ribatek during a longer period of time and regard the company as a reliable and skillful manufacturer of highly specialized products," explains CEO of Fibertex Nonwovens, Jørgen Bech Madsen. "We are experiencing a growing demand for new textiles being manufactured in line with the spunlacing method, and therefore we were to choose between building a new production line at one of our existing manufacturing sites or to take over an existing manufacturer. We chose the latter – in particular due to Ribatek’s high quality and strategically important geographical location."

Fibertex's existing spunlacing technology is located at its French subsidiary, which was acquired from Tharreau Industries in 2011.

Ribatek is situated in the town Cerkezkoy in the western part of Turkey, almost 100 km northwest of Istanbul. The locaton provides easy access here to qualified labor and raw materials, and in addition Fibertex Nonwovens will gain better access the important Turkish market and furthermore to Western Asia and the Middle East. Found in 2006, the company has two technologically sophisticated production lines with an annual capacity of 8000 tons per year.

"We see a large potential in developing the company further and expanding our sales in an easterly direction," Madsen adds. "The spunlacing products are softer and have better uniformity than our traditional nonwoven textiles, and are therefore much more applicable for advanced use in the automobile industry, for industrial purposes and for production of wet wipes and other hygiene products."

Fibertex is owned by Schouw & Co., Aarhus, Denmark. President Jens Bjerg Sørensen, said his company has been looking at Ribatex for a while and is content with the fact that the transaction has now fallen into place. "The acquisition will provide us with the necessary capacity, which we are lacking in the short run and will give us some strategical options of expanding with a longer time horizon. Hence, we are expecting that Ribatek will contribute positively to our European consolidation," he says.

The acquisition should be finalized in early November.