All the best from Florida: Thursday morning, Oct. 3, at IFAI Expo led off with lists of winners for the year, including the most popular products on the show floor. The eighth annual Show Stopper competition was designed to showcase the best of the best in the industry, from fabrics, equipment and chemicals to services and end products.
Designed to recognize the most popular new products each year from our exhibitors, the Show Stopper Awards acknowledge the newest, most innovative, useful and exciting, effective, efficient and economical entries, as well as the most environmentally sound products at the show. Entries were submitted by exhibitors and displayed on the show floor, with winners selected by a committee of industry experts.
And the winners are:
DITF German Institutes for Textile & Fiber Research took the lead in the Chemicals, Coatings & Compounds category, for UV-Curable Pigment Inks for inkjet printing work on any textile substrate with light-fastness properties. Use of the inks accommodates a soft hand to textiles and an energy savings of 50-90 percent, compared to traditional printing.
DITF German Institutes for Textile & Fiber Research also won in the End Products category, with Invisible Brand Protection: To prevent product piracy, the solution uses a fully transparent security ink called Transparency™ that can be applied to textiles to ensure authenticity. The security code can be detected by a smartphone with an integrated IR camera.
Autometrix Inc. was the winner in the Equipment & Tools category, for the InSight Projection System. Paired with Autometrix cutting tables, the InSight System projects cut pattern outlines and identifying data directly on top of the fabric pattern pieces. Without time spent plotting or harm to the pattern pieces, production is streamlined.
Sunbrella® Fabrics took the prize in the Fabrics, Fibers & Film category, for Sunbrella Horizon, a synthetic leather upholstery product available in two embossed patterns and 30 colors. A three-year warranty against pink staining and a five-year overall warranty are offered.
Forsstrom High Frequency ABwon in the category of Hardware, Findings & Accessories with the ForFlexx Universal Corner Plate. The pre-treated universal corner plates for lightweight structures make it possible to RF weld the corner plate directly onto the structure, rather than bolting it.
Miller Weldmasterwas the winner in the category Services to Manufacturers, with the Miller CONNECT. The cutting-edge technology allows for instant, easy monitoring of all production output in real time throughout the day to provide accurate and timely information on machine performance.
A list of the 2019 Show Stopper participants can be viewed online at https://ifaiexpo.com/show-stoppers. This year’s winners will also be included in the November 2019 issue of Specialty Fabrics Review, as part of the coverage of IFAI Expo 2019 in Orlando, Florida.