MAS Holdings, a global apparel and textile group headquartered in Sri Lanka, has secured an investment in HeiQ AeoniQ™ to support the development of next-gen cellulosic filament fibers to replace polyester and nylon. MAS Holdings is the largest apparel and textile manufacturer in South Asia with sales of approximately $2 billion. The partnership secures MAS a stake in HeiQ AeoniQ GmbH, a subsidiary of HeiQ Group, which will produce HeiQ AeoniQ™, climate-positive cellulosic yarn.
With the investment, MAS Holdings becomes the first manufacturer to work with HeiQ AeoniQ™ to offer a sustainable alternative to polyester and nylon. MAS Holdings’ investment is part of the group’s “Plan for Change” strategy to make a positive impact on the environment. The plan aims to generate 50 percent of the company’s revenue from sustainable products by 2025 and revolutionize the textile industry with a focus on innovation, sustainable sourcing and circular economy at scale.
In closing the deal, HeiQ and MAS agreed to a five-year offtake agreement for 3,000 tons of HeiQ AeoniQ™ yarn in 2025 and 5,000 tons per year from 2026 to 2029, valued by HeiQ at a total of $100 million. MAS will complete this commitment within a specified timeframe after Milestone 1 is achieved and a joint plan for commercialization is in place. HeiQ and MAS strongly believe that rapid scaling is key to the rapid adoption of sustainable, circular technologies like HeiQ AeoniQ™.
The HeiQ AeoniQ™ technology was launched in the fourth quarter of 2021 and has since attracted the attention of major global companies in the textile and apparel industry. The proprietary manufacturing process allows a cellulosic filament yarn to be produced from a wide range of non-valorized feedstock and is able to replicate comparable performance characteristics of polyester or nylon while being sustainable and endlessly circular. The HeiQ AeoniQ™ pilot plant in Austria has been producing this industry-first continuous cellulosic filament yarn since the third quarter of 2022, with a capacity of up to 100 tons, to be increased to up to 300 tons by the end of 2023. The HeiQ AeoniQ™ production expansion is expected to reach its final peak in early 2026 with the construction of an entirely new gigafactory with a capacity of 30,000 tons per year and an estimated investment of $250 million.
Polyester and nylon, two oil-based fibers that are virtually impossible to recycle, account for about 70 percent of total global textile production. They take between 350 and 1,000 years to break down in nature, are currently less than 1 percent recycled in closed-loop systems, and are the source of 35 percent of the microplastics found in the oceans today. HeiQ AeoniQ™ was innovated and is currently being hyper-scaled up to change this situation.
