Suren’s Insight on MAS And Sri Lanka’s Apparel Manufacturing Industry
Suren Fernando, our Chief Executive Officer was recently interviewed for “Made in Sri Lanka” published by the National Chamber of Exporters of Sri Lanka.
These are his insights on MAS Holdings and Sri Lanka’s apparel manufacturing industry as we strive to achieve our planned growth strategies aligned with our company’s vision for 2025.
Q: How has the brand grown over the years?
A: MAS Holdings is one of Sri Lanka’s largest apparel and textile manufacturers that has continuously reinvented itself over the years to deliver futuristic products and services that the capricious industry demands. Established in Sri Lanka in 1987, the company has evolved since to become a worldwide brand with 53 manufacturing facilities spread across 16 countries, and a workforce of over 99,000 people supporting it.
Disruptive technologies have revolutionised the global fashion industry, introducing concepts such as ‘smart clothing’ and ‘apparel tech’. The vision of ubiquitous computing resulted in the advent of wearable technology, which was popularised in the 1980s. Today, these wearables have evolved from rigid, cumbersome devices to truly wearable smart garments, with MAS fuelling the revolution and leading the way for apparel tech right here in Sri Lanka.
Powered by a culture of innovation and encouraged by visionary leadership, MAS has been collaboratively introducing some of the most groundbreaking apparel innovations based on extensive research and development in material science, nanotechnology and e-textiles. It is at the forefront of transforming the future of apparel through wearable tech, femtech, performance-wear and other technologies that are driving the fashion revolution.
In its 32 years of experience, the company has never failed to live up to its vision of inspiring, innovating, creating value and respecting humanity. This has paved the path for its evolution from a business organisation to a global community with some of the world’s foremost brands in fashion and style backing it up.
Q: How important are innovation and product development to the company?
A: Innovation is a core pillar at MAS and its operations are carried out through Twinery — the company’s innovation arm. Twinery primarily focusses on three main components — innovation, digital and sustainability — and has developed scientific and engineering solutions that have transformed the local apparel and textile industry. Twinery leverages MAS’ global partner ecosystem to experiment with over 50 disruptive technologies across lighting, heating, odour, protection and aqua-repellency, and continues to reimagine and reengineer products and processes that are transforming the world of fashion.
MAS boasts of a remarkable digital solutions portfolio which includes an array of consumer technologies that are globally recognised for their outstanding design and engineering potential. Become, Spryng and our collaboration with ODLO are three such ventures that are currently revolutionising the apparel industry. Become is Twinery’s femtech startup that produces menopause clothing with Anti-Flush Technology designed to combat hot flushes.
Twinery’s other startup — Spryng — has developed one of the most advanced muscle recovery tools in the world for those suffering from mobility issues. Its WaveTech compression pattern mimics a skeletal pump which enhances the natural circulatory flow, and is especially beneficial to those with spinal injuries and related disabilities.
In partnership with ODLO — a global pioneer in sportswear incorporating Clim8’s intelligent thermal technology — Twinery has launched an intelligent middle layer of clothing for high climate performers, known as I-THERMIC. I-THERMIC uses intelligent active heating technology to regulate the temperature accordingly, thus eliminating the need for multiple layers of clothing in extreme temperatures.
Additionally, MAS has also developed a patent-pending technology for underwear that can absorb body fluids, which is currently available online and in retail stores. Twinery also focusses on impact protection, the result of which is the customisable protective headgear which utilises MAS’ patented injection foam mold technology. This technology has been employed in the Canterbury Reinforcer headguard which, conforming to World Rugby Specifications, was worn by the players in the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan.
Q: How does MAS embrace the concept of Sustainability?
A: Going beyond the innovative mindset that is so strongly embedded in the company’s culture and services, MAS remains highly dedicated to tackling some of the most important environmental and social challenges of our time. Sustainability is a huge part of our company’s culture and we’re currently focused on accelerating our journey towards ‘Zero Waste Apparel’ by 2025.
Consumers are becoming increasingly conscious about the environment as awareness on the apparel industry’s significant contribution to waste and pollution increases. There is a constant debate as to whether the apparel industry can ever sustain sustainability. A long-term proposition such as this requires commitment, persistence and a positive outlook on the whole.
In line with this, Twinery has introduced the innovative Truecycled Process in collaboration with BPL Holdings. The process involves recycling plastic PET bottles into polyester yarn. We’re highly elated that this breakthrough fabric was used to produce the Sri Lankan national cricket team’s jerseys for the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup.
Q: Do quality management and environmental concerns receive adequate attention vis-à-vis exports?
A: International markets still consider price and quality as paramount factors in the selection of sourcing partners, but environmental management systems have become an important feature that is now frequently taken into consideration in the selection process. At the moment, it may seem that political instability in Sri Lanka as well as political tensions and unsettled disputes in South Asian countries, such as the bilateral trade suspension between India and Pakistan, seem to receive more attention from global trade networks.
But regardless of such factors, Sri Lanka has always been considered a top sourcing destination founded upon high quality and ethical manufacturing practices by the global market. Having adhered to internationally accepted ISO standards over the past few decades for quality management and assurance, environmental management, occupational safety, and information security management, such benchmarks across the Sri Lankan export sector have been considered a norm through voluntary adoption rather than regulatory practice.
So even though environmental concerns may not receive their fair share of attention, I believe that Sri Lankan exporters have greatly benefitted through our adherence to global standards in not just environmental management, but across all verticals. It has been a clear advantage when penetrating into European and US markets, and continues to be so as we expand to new global markets such as China and India.
Q: What other lessons can Sri Lankan exporters learn from their global counterparts?
A: I believe the most important enablers of trade in developed countries are reforms that facilitate more trade liberalisation, direct foreign investment, and conditions that foster a healthy competitive environment for the private sector. Developed economies encourage rapid and innovative responses from the private sector that increases competitiveness and attraction for foreign investment. This also nurtures better conditions for trade networks and partnerships to develop between our country and our established global counterparts.
Additionally, we need to identify new sources of competitiveness to upgrade our position across not just one but all global value chains, and translate that into high-quality opportunities for foreign investment. Diversification of our export portfolio to high-value products is yet another lesson we can learn from countries like Vietnam. As an economy, we also need to enhance our degree of flexibility to adapt to external variables through conclusive trade negotiations and reforms.
Q: Is the prevailing export strategy acceptable given the realities of global markets?
A: We have seen our influence in global trade change a fragmented vertical manufacturing industry into a highly integrated global production network. The next ongoing revolution in global exports is the rise of the service trade. This is the direction of the global market today and Sri Lanka’s National Export Strategy (NES) places emphasis on IT/BPM as well as Wellness Tourism for export diversification — two service sectors that will be very crucial to remain competitive in today’s global trade landscape.
Another opportunity for sourcing countries such as ours has arisen from trade tensions between China and the United States, which triggered sharp movements across global markets. Higher tariffs and weak sentiments between these major economies — while affecting global value chains (GVCs) — will also see a reconfiguration of GVCs out of China and into other developing South Asian nations.
Having understood and adapted to the complexities of global production processes, Sri Lanka stands a good chance of establishing our position across other GVCs with high quality infrastructure and workforce skills, with appropriate domestic regulations in place.
Q: Have adequate measures been taken to simplify the processes related to export activity?
A: There has been great progress in the simplification of export-related processes through the digitisation of administrative and institutional infrastructure in accordance with the NES of Sri Lanka. With the NES we have a business-enabling, coherent blueprint for export growth endorsed by all relevant public and private stakeholders. Anchored to this strategy, a five-year action plan is currently being executed with a set target for the year 2022 that is re-engineering conventional export practices into integrated systems and streamlined administrative processes, resulting in improved efficiencies and response times across most export-related activities.
I am hopeful that we will continue this momentum of improving trade-related support functions that will benefit not only existing export verticals, but also the emerging areas of Sri Lanka’s export industry.
