Antai Textile: Three Decades of Tempering as the Invisible Champion in Acrylic Fibers, Environmental Innovation Leads New Momentum in Textile Peak Season

In the midsummer month of July, the textile industry enters the traditional peak season for production and sales. Inside the production workshop of Antai Textile in Zhangjiagang, Jiangsu, rows of modern spinning equipment are operating at high speed, with a faint fiber fragrance filling the air. Director Huang of the Production Department stands in front of the large screen in the central control room, closely monitoring the real-time data of each production line. His brows slightly relax as he looks at a set of raw material monitoring curves: "Jilin Petrochemical's new plant will be put into operation at the end of the month, which should ease the tight supply of acrylonitrile, and we can further increase our acrylic top production capacity."

Founded in 1993, this textile enterprise has undergone more than three decades of market tempering and has become the invisible champion in China's acrylic yarn sector. Li Xiong, Marketing Manager, has been particularly busy recently. He just finished a video conference with a well-known home textile brand in Zhejiang, which showed strong interest in Antai Textile's colored acrylic top. "Huilong New Materials' dope-dyed polyester fiber has attracted market attention, which precisely confirms the foresight of our layout in dope-dyed acrylic fibers many years ago," Li Xiong told the author in his office, pointing to the industry report spread out on the desk, where keywords such as "green environmental protection" and "high efficiency and energy saving" were repeatedly circled.

As one of the early domestic enterprises engaged in the research and development of dope-dyed acrylic fibers, Antai Textile's colored acrylic top adopts melt coloring technology to achieve fiber coloring from the source, which not only avoids the high energy consumption and high pollution problems caused by traditional dyeing, but also has advantages in color fastness and color consistency. "Now downstream customers have increasingly high environmental requirements. Our colored acrylic top can help customers reduce nearly 200 tons of sewage discharge per ton of product, which is our core competitiveness," Li Xiong said, picking up a roll of sapphire blue acrylic top sample, with the threads showing a uniform and soft luster in the sunlight. "Take this acrylic yarn for high-end scarves, for example. It uses 120-count microfiber and is combined with dope-dyeing technology. Its color saturation is 30% higher than that of traditional dyeing, and orders have been scheduled until the end of the third quarter."

Every change in the raw material market affects the nerves of the production end. At the beginning of July, when news came that Shandong Haijiang's acrylonitrile plant had a temporary shutdown for maintenance, Antai Textile's supply chain team quickly activated the emergency plan. Director Huang introduced: "We have established a raw material procurement network covering Northeast, East China, and Northwest China, and maintained long-term strategic cooperation with leading enterprises such as Jilin Petrochemical and Lihuayi. This time, Lihuayi lowered its quotation by 50 yuan/ton. We effectively stabilized cost fluctuations through a combination of centralized procurement and futures hedging." In the intelligent warehousing system behind him, different grades of acrylonitrile raw materials are stacked in different areas, and the inventory management system displays real-time industry inventory data of 45,800 tons, which provides accurate reference for production scheduling.

Facing the stable price in the pure polyester yarn market, Antai Textile has chosen to continue to make efforts on the differentiated track. In addition to conventional acrylic yarn and acrylic top products, the company invests 5% of its annual sales in the research and development of fancy yarns, and has now developed more than 200 varieties such as slub yarn, chenille, and loop yarn. "The stable price of pure polyester yarn of Hangzhou Juqian Textile reflects the increasingly fierce competition in conventional products," Li Xiong analyzed. "Our strategy is 'having what others don't, and being better than others when having the same'. For example, this segment-colored acrylic yarn used in high-end women's clothing is processed by a three-roller fancy twisting machine, which can weave natural color transition effects, with a premium space of more than 20% higher than ordinary yarns."

From the initial single acrylic yarn production to the current formation of a complete product line of 'acrylic top - colored acrylic top - fancy yarn', Antai Textile has witnessed the transformation and upgrading of China's textile industry. The company's new 120-mu production base will be put into operation at the end of the year, when the annual production capacity of acrylic top will exceed 80,000 tons, of which colored acrylic top will account for 40%. "For 30 years, we have only done one thing: to make acrylic yarns exquisite and professional," Director Huang said, looking at the busy young workers in the workshop with expectation in his eyes. "After the new plant of Jilin Petrochemical is put into operation next month, we plan to add two more dope-dyeing production lines to bring more environmentally friendly and fashionable acrylic products into thousands of households."

At a time when the textile industry is undergoing in-depth adjustment, Antai Textile is writing its own chapter in the acrylic yarn segment with a focused attitude and innovative spirit. Starting from the entrepreneurial hotland of Zhangjiagang, this established textile enterprise is radiating new vitality and injecting a steady stream of momentum into the high-quality development of China's textile industry.