The excellence of the Italian textile machines is recognized all over the world; innovation, creativity, quality, reliability are the main features which allowed the Italian industry of textile machines to attain a worldwide leadership, and to become the pride of the whole Italian industry of instrumental machines.

 In particular, the knitting machinery sector has a share of 18% in the Italian production of the whole sector (about 470 million Euro). The exports of knitting machines amounted in 2005 to 392 million euro, thus confirming the absolute quality of the Italian machinery working worldwide. In the first eleven months of 2006 the exports value was equivalent to 357 million Euro.

The success of the Italian knitting machines is based mainly on the strong synergy existing between the machinery manufacturers and their users and on the strong innovative drive resulting from this synergy. The co-operation between the machine manufacturers and their customers has played on the strong textile tradition existing in Italy and located in the Italian knitting districts. Just the continuous exchange of experiences resulting from the typical dynamism and creativity of this districts permits to the textile machinery industry to develop, contributing at the same time to the success of the whole Italian textile system.

The knitwear production in Italy is concentrated today on small lots addressed to market sectors of medium-high quality level. The market requires primarily high sampling potential and large flexibility in machine use. It is essential that the knitwear factories are in a position to satisfy as quickly as possible the needs of a market coping with more and more frequent fashion changes. The Italian supply of knitting machines is fully capable of meeting these needs from the technological point of view.

As to circular knitting machines, the technological development was as considerable as the widening of their offer. The Italian manufacturers rank therefore in top position on international level.

In some cases they were even able to understand in advance the needs and the trends of the market, developing technological solutions which gave rise to new production niches.

A typical Italian production is represented by circular machines for seamless clothing. The international leadership of the Italian companies in this sector is highlighted by the widespread diffusion of these machines on the world markets as well as by their steady technological improvement. The application of sophisticated mechanical, electronic and pneumatic devices allows to process a wide range of spun yarns and continuous filaments for the realization of rather complex textile structures, not obtainable with traditional cutting and sewing processes.

The Italian manufacturers of this type of machinery were the first to understand the need to offer the knitters the solutions ensuring a break-even point between the technical performances and the amount of needed investments. In fact the technological progress led to the realization of machines which could produce extremely complex stitch structures, having as their most representative article the so-called fully knitted garment.

Undoubtedly electronics, which finds wide use by all manufacturers, played a fundamental role in the achievement of these technological innovations both for the programming and for the control of the various machine devices.

The progress attained in the last decade by flat knitting machine was so quick and significant, that one could hardly hope in further new developments; and yet the accomplishment of the fully knitted garment, also known as fully fashioned or knit and wear garment, is a target which is by now largely attained. A considerable increase in the width of the gauge range has also been reached, so that machine gauges have now a range which could not even be thought of only few years ago. All these innovations, aimed at enhancing enormously the flexibility of the machines, are the state-of-the-art of the technological development.

Within the Italian panorama of this sector, some particular developments for special makes are worth to be mentioned. One of these is the intarsia technique, a knitting process in which the Italian manufacturers always excelled with solutions ensuring high sampling potential. Today some manufacturers produce intarsia machines which couple a modern but essential configuration with sampling potentials, otherwise obtainable only with the hand-knitting process.

Concerning the sector of crochet machines, Italy is leading in their technological development. The Italian manufacturers brought a series of improvements which extended the application fields of these machines (above all in the wide sector of technical textiles).

Within this panorama on the Italian knitting machines, a particular mention deserves the sector of hosiery machines. In this field, the Italian manufacturers have worldwide absolute leadership as to technological innovation. All the new models of single-cylinder hosiery machines for ladies’ stockings and panty-hoses, as well as of single- and double-cylinder machines for men’s and children socks which the Italian manufacturers propose on the world markets are equipped with the most up-to-date electronic and computer-controlled systems, which permit a quicker article change also between very different articles. The applied components is very sophisticated and allows the production of exclusively cost-effective stitch structures.

Sampling possibilities have been significantly extended through net designs, small and large patterns in several colours (even more than ten patterns on the whole stocking). Particular mention deserves  the innovation level which characterizes the toe closing process directly on men’s sock machines. The customer can choose among various technical proposals, each offering different features as regards sewing quality, reliability of execution, productivity and cost of investment.

The enormous progress and the undisputed success worldwide of the Italian hosiery sector is certainly to be ascribed to the close co-operation existing ever since between the machine manufacturers and the hosiery producers.

The swift interaction between the new exigences imposed on the knitters by the fashion market and the time needed to develop new machine models in line with such requirements proves once again the winning solution both for the machine manufacturers and for the users.