Inescop pushes Industry 4.0 for Spain’s footwear makers
Around 50 Spanish companies from the footwear-making region of Valencia have viewed a new Industry 4.0 smart system that its designers say can reduce costs, waste and raw material consumption.
The programme has been designed by footwear technology centre Inescop and has been part funded with a €400,000 grant from the Valencian Institute of Business Competitiveness.
Inescop claims the technology will allow companies to reduce samples by up to 30%, design and manufacture a sole in a matter of hours, and obtain data on downtimes between production processes.
The Valencian regional minister for economy, Rafael Climent, described it as “a revolution for the sector”. “It validates the aid packages we launched in our ministry with the support of IVACE in 2018, aimed at making demonstrators available to companies so they could see how useful new technologies are, how to apply them and how to use their results, while promoting technology and know-how transfers to our companies.”
The region houses most of Spain’s leather footwear companies, centred around the towns of Elche, Elda, Villena and Vall de Uxó.
