The moment of truth has come. After years of research to improve its technology “3D pasting”He suppresses the stage By injecting a polymer from the company Elche, it allows all parts of a shoe to be joined at the same time. Simplicity Works just started first production line from him The factory in Elche Business Park. Facilities that will serve to definitively test this new shoe production system, starting with a production capacity of 150,000 pairs, but expected to exceed that capacity. 400,000 pairs per year Once completed, in about nine months.
And that’s just the beginning, because the firm’s plans go through the construction of a building. new factory larger sizes allowing the production of at least two million shoes once a year in five years, according to its founder and CEO, Adrian Hernandez.
They are aware of the difficulty of moving the firm from the lab to the production line and the complexity that large-scale production represents, so they decided to hire one of the biggest. Experts in footwear industrialization from all over Europe Danish to help them with their homework Paul Haugaard Petersen. A manager who spent most of his career there EchoBeing one of the biggest manufacturers in Europe, it is one of the main references in the sector with its annual sales exceeding 1.000 million Euros.
Specifically, Haugaard was responsible for: To modernize the production of the Danish company, robotization of some of its processes, representing a new standard for the industry, as well as with the person in charge of the company in Thailand, China, Slovakia or Portugal. He then continued his work. CEO of German Lloydhe is also another of the big European shoemakers he gave a boost to.
From The new position of the Chief Operating Officer (COO), His responsibility will be to initiate and oversee the production infrastructure of Simplicity Works, with which he came after seven years of friendship with the founder.
In this regard, Haugaard believes that the system developed by the company from Elche will allow. Europe is getting competitive again when it comes to shoe production, suppressing many of the manual processes such as sewing – sewing the parts – which currently represents the highest cost for the industry. He also points out that the technology of joining parts by injecting polymer into a mold allows the development of new designs.
hiring
Haugaard’s landing coincides with the start of production, which Simplicity Works calls its “pilot facility,” but it hopes to produce more than 400,000 pairs a year there. Currently, there is already two interested customersOne of the important companies of the Spanish sector -the name of which they do not want to be disclosed- and German wortman. The firm is in the contracting process to complete the contract. The first staff of 35 workers Considering the highly qualified employee profile required by a factory with these characteristics, who the plants will work with turns out to be a more complex task than expected. And this is what the company urgently needs, along with the line operators. electromechanical, mechanical and industrial design engineers.
In terms of resources needed for expansion plans, the company only a few months ago. 1.8 million non-refundable funding injections from the European EIC Accelerato programr. In addition European Investment Bank (EIB) she was also lucky 15 million euro for its development over the next few years, yes, this must be accompanied by an equivalent investment by private partners. Currently, the firm has launched a funding round, which it hopes will raise around 2.4m euros in six months, which the EIB will complete with the same amount.
Regarding the future factory, which will produce at least two million pairs per year, the company has yet to decide on a location, but the intention is to keep it at Elche to take advantage of the synergy created by one of these already. Europe’s largest shoe design and production centers.
The company’s plans also include license your technology, so that other companies can set up their own factories with this system. In fact, there’s already a factory in Mexico that works this way for a major North American brand.