On Tuesday afternoon, the company Textilcord Steinfort S.A. celebrated its 50th anniversary and were paid a visit by HRH Grand Duke Henri, with Luxembourg's Minister of Labour, Nicolas Schmidt, the Secretary of State for the Economy, Francine Closener, the Mayor of Steinfort, Jean-Marie Wirth, and the owner of the Glanzstoff group that owns Textilcord, Dr. Cornelius Grupp, also speaking at the official ceremony in Steinfort.
The formal part of the event included speeches by Secretary of State Francine Closener and Dr. Cornelius Grupp, the owner of the group, and Arnaud Closson, Managing Director of Textilcord Steinfort.
The company, specialised in the conversion process of textile reinforcements required for the manufacturing of tyres in Europe, currently employs 140 people.
“In order to better respond to the technological changes occurring within the tyre industry and based on our willingness to differentiate ourselves from our global competitors, we have consistently developed and diversified our products and services offering. This also allowed us to offer new and increasingly innovative solutions to our customers", explained Arnaud Closson, Managing Director. He added "the production site now generates almost 35% of its turnover with products that have been developed over the past three years. This has been made possible thanks to the continuous investments in our production facilities and in our research and development through close cooperation with our customers and external organisations, such as universities and technological institutes”.
The Glanzstoff Industries Group, based in Austria and owned by the German-Austrian entrepreneur Dr. Cornelius Grupp, is specialised in the manufacturing of textile reinforcements for technical usage, whose main application is the reinforcement of tyres. The Group has three production sites in the Czech Republic, Italy and Luxembourg. The finished products are exported worldwide, mainly in Europe but also in North America, South America and Asia.
The products manufactured in the Glanzstoff’s plants are primarily intended for high-performance tyres (high speed rating, "Run-flat" tyres and racing tyres), whether they are directed to the market of original equipment (tyres fitted on new vehicles) or the replacement market. Thus, these products meet the highest requirements in terms of safety and performance, required by the automotive and tyre industries.
These technical fabrics are made of viscose filaments, produced by the Group in the Czech Republic, as well as synthetic filaments purchased from external suppliers. These filaments are then transformed into textile reinforcements through a conversion process divided into three major steps: twisting, weaving and dipping.
The plant in Luxembourg, Textilcord Steinfort SA, was established on 7 July 1965, by the Belgian-American Uniroyal Englebert Group. The works that started in 1965 were completed in 1966 with the first deliveries of finished products in 1967. The plant was then integrated into the Continental AG company based in Germany, before being acquired in 1997 by the Austrian Group Glanzstoff under the holding CAG. This acquisition, which marked a major turning point for the Steinfort site, materialised the willingness of the Glanzstoff Group, specialised in the manufacture of industrial viscose filaments, to enter the downstream of the value chain and thus to deliver finished products directly to the tyre manufacturers, while keeping a close eye on its environmental footprint.
“In a growing concern for sustainable development, Glanzstoff-Textilcord has led since 5 years now, projects to optimize the use of energy resources and thus limit our environmental footprint. These efforts enabled reductions of 40-50% of our electricity, gas and water consumption”, concluded Arnaud Closson.
Photos (below) by Geoff Thompson
