The Lenzing Group announced the investment of a TENCEL fiber plant in the US. The new state-of-the-art facility with a production capacity of 90,000 tons per year will be the largest TENCEL fiber plant in the world.

As announced, the new plant will be located at the company’s site in Mobile, Alabama. It will utilize the latest technological standards and is scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2019. The investment volume will total US$ 293 million.

The expansion plan aims to increase the share of specialty fibers as a percentage of revenue to 50% by 2020, according to Lenzing.

“This investment represents another major milestone in the implementation of our corporate strategy sCore TEN. It will bring us a big step further to reach our target of 50% revenue from specialty fibers by 2020“, explained Lenzing CEO Stefan Doboczky.

“This expansion also underscores our commitment to all our TENCEL fiber customers, who continue to make their products even more sustainable using TENCEL fiber, the world’s most sustainable botanic fiber,” added Doboczky.

New CTO appointed to Management Board

Lenzing also decided to create a new Management Board role, pooling together the key technical, operational and engineering responsibilities. The Supervisory Board of the company appointed Heiko Arnold as the new Chief Technology Officer.

In addition to a strong scientific and technical education, Arnold has gained many years of experience with BASF in the realization of major investment projects and continuous operational improvements as well as extensive know-how in Research & Development. He will be responsible for all technical departments in Lenzing.

“We are pleased to welcome Heiko Arnold, a further expert with broad international experience, to Lenzing’s Management Board team“, commented Hanno Bästlein, Chairman of the Lenzing Supervisory Board.

“Lenzing is on a successful, dynamic growth course with the development and implementation of the new sCore TEN corporate strategy, and that makes an increase in the Management Board to four persons a reasonable step. His 15 years of experience in Asia, in the realization of major investment projects and in operational excellence make Arnold a perfect match for the challenges faced by Lenzing“, explained Bästlein.

Lenzing currently has a worldwide production capacity of 222,000 tons per year of TENCEL fibers. The new plant in Mobile plus the already announced debottlenecking projects at the other TENCEL fiber sites will increase the total capacity by more than 50% by 2019.