By Will Motchar, President and CEO, Navis TubeTex
After more than three decades in textile finishing, I’ve learned that every few years our industry finds a new buzzword.
“Lean manufacturing. Industry 4.0. Digital transformation. Artificial intelligence.”
Each promises to change everything. Some do. Most simply become another tool in the toolbox. Today, artificial intelligence is dominating conversations throughout manufacturing. Every conference has multiple sessions on AI. Every supplier claims to have an AI strategy. Every publication is asking whether AI will transform textile production.
I believe it’s the wrong question.
The real question isn’t whether AI will change textile finishing. It’s whether we’ll use it to make better finishing decisions.
Because at the end of the day, fabrics still have to be finished. Customers still expect consistent quality. Mills still battle rising energy costs. Operators are still expected to produce more with fewer resources. Sustainability targets continue to grow more aggressive. None of those challenges disappear because someone adds AI to a software package.
In my experience, the biggest advances in textile finishing have never come from chasing the newest technology. They’ve come from solving the industry’s biggest problems. Today, those problems are becoming increasingly clear. Energy has become one of the largest operating expenses in a finishing plant. Every dryer, oven, tenter frame, and curing process is being evaluated through a different lens than it was just a few years ago. Efficiency is no longer simply about reducing utility costs—it’s about remaining competitive.
Sustainability has evolved in much the same way. Years ago, environmental initiatives were often viewed as future goals. Today, they’re customer requirements. Manufacturers are looking for technologies that reduce water consumption, chemical usage, emissions, and waste without sacrificing quality or productivity.
That’s one of the reasons we’ve seen so much interest in technologies like precision foam application, advanced spray systems, and dry powder impregnation. They aren’t being adopted simply because they’re innovative. They’re being adopted because they solve real production challenges.
At the same time, another challenge continues to grow.
Experience is becoming harder to replace. Many of the operators who built today’s textile industry are approaching retirement. Their knowledge wasn’t learned from manuals. It was developed over decades of watching fabrics behave, understanding chemistry, adjusting equipment, and recognizing problems before sensors ever detected them.
This is where I believe artificial intelligence can make the greatest contribution—not by replacing that expertise, but by preserving and extending it. Imagine giving every operator access to decades of production history or recognizing a quality issue before it creates hundreds of yards of off-spec fabric. Or identifying maintenance problems before unexpected downtime occurs.
That’s where AI belongs. Not making decisions for experienced people, but helping experienced people make better decisions.The same is true for automation.
I’ve never viewed automation as replacing skilled workers. I’ve always viewed it as allowing skilled workers to spend more time solving important problems instead of making repetitive adjustments.
The mills that will lead our industry over the next decade won’t necessarily have the newest machines.
They’ll have the smartest operations.
Their equipment will be connected.
Their production data will be accessible.
Their finishing processes will consume less energy and fewer resources.
Their operators will have better information than ever before. And they’ll continue investing in the expertise that has always separated great textile manufacturers from average ones.
Technology will absolutely shape the future of textile finishing. But technology has never been the industry’s greatest asset.
People have.
The future isn’t about replacing experience with artificial intelligence. It’s about combining decades of finishing expertise with intelligent technologies that help us operate more efficiently, more sustainably, and with greater consistency than ever before.
That’s the future I see for our industry—and it’s one worth building.