SANKO. Fundamentally changing the textile world.
With a history of responsible business stretching back 118 years, SANKO TEXTILE is a cornerstone of SANKO HOLDING, one of Turkey’s strongest and best-known family enterprises. SANKO TEXTILE’s operations encompass cotton and synthetic yarn production, home textiles, weaving and knitting. As a traditional company, it has a special responsibility and opportunity to ensure its work benefits people and the planet.
As part of its focus on championing circularity, SANKO introduced a new recycling technology venture, RE&UP, in 2023. This specializes in textile-to-textile recycling, enabling the transformation of materials including cotton, polyester and poly-cotton into high quality, traceable raw material ready for re-spinning.
The collaboration with ANDRITZ started in 2021, when SANKO ordered a mechanical recycling line – and subsequently a further nine in 2022. At over 14 million euros, this is the biggest single-order project in the history of ANDRITZ’s textile division in Turkey. Five lines are already in operation under the contract, with five more scheduled for delivery in 2024.
The textile industry is standing at a crossroads and faces the urgent task of transforming the production and manufacture of textiles and garments. Industry players are aware that scalable, efficient and effective textile-to-textile recycling will be the game- changer that the sector so desperately needs. Upcoming global legislation is not only going to suggest this, but will make sure these technologies are an important and required component for brands to manage their textile waste, both now and in the years to come. RE&UP contributes to this by providing a solution to the global problem of textile waste.
ONE MILLION TONS OF RECYCLING CAPACITY BY 2030
While RE&UP is a new venture, it is built on more than a century of textile industry expertise. The company’s strategy aims to revolutionize textile-to-textile recycling, and to help transform the industry to be fully circular. The task of managing and processing textile waste is a challenge that affects all players along the supply chain, not least fashion brands.
RE&UP’s goal is to enable a seamless closed-loop ecosystem for end-of-life textile waste and through its feedstock agnostic process, which is capable of processing the majority of production and post-consumer waste, it offers valuable recycled textile raw materials for the whole industry at scale. The young company is already providing this as an end-to-end and scalable solution that will meet market demand for recycled textiles. That is why RE&UP has a target of recycling more than 1 million tons of textile waste by 2030.
“RE&UP leverages the vast knowledge of our parent company SANKO in spinning recycled fibers, which requires specialized fiber and yarn engineering expertise,” says RE&UP’s General Manager, Andreas Dorner.
“What we can do in-house with this expertise, we will do in-house. However, to truly push boundaries, it is essential that we collaborate with companies that also have expertise in their areas of specialization. ANDRITZ has expertise in the sustainable industrialization of textile recycling technology, and has demonstrated great results. We knew that by joining forces we could be an instrument for great change in the industry.”
A PARTNERSHIP FOR A GREEN FUTURE
With this project, the challenge was to ensure that the machine technology required was completely fit for purpose, and that the set-up process was as smooth as possible. ANDRITZ played a crucial role, providing significant support and guidance during this phase to help RE&UP overcome these challenges. Having successfully established the pilot plant in Turkey, future RE&UP hubs to recycle post-consumer goods will be established in Europe, Asia and America, providing brands with a comprehensive solution for textile recycling and circularity.
As Andreas Dorner says: “We are working with ANDRITZ’s technology to tackle this challenge together. We provide a solution that not only reduces environmental impact by diverting waste from landfill and incineration, but also puts it back into production, thus contributing to a global vision for a scalable circular economy for fashion. As we continue to establish more bases for RE&UP around the world, we will rely on ANDRITZ for further support to ensure RE&UP can deliver on the needs of our customers globally.”
With ANDRITZ Laroche in France, ANDRITZ has created a unique competence center for mechanical textile recycling. ANDRITZ has almost a century of experience in the fine art of textile processing, and offers high-quality, efficient and proven solutions. In the technical center in France, customers have the opportunity to test and verify the technical solutions. Meanwhile, the sales and spare parts team supports customers throughout the service life of the machinery. It was this vision of comprehensive technical solutions and services that convinced SANKO to put its trust in ANDRITZ’s expertise, creating the basis for a long-term partnership.
