Closely connected:
Nonwoven products and solutions

As one of the world's leading suppliers of high-quality binders and polymer additives under the VINNAPAS^®, VINNAPAS^® eco and VINNOL^® brands, we provide market-driven solutions for a wide range of nonwoven applications. Russell Thorpe and Dr. Holger Poths are WACKER’s nonwovens experts. They explain what makes our products special – and what else is behind them.

Why do so many nonwovens customers choose WACKER products?

Russell Thorpe: First of all, our products deliver proven performance and give nonwovens outstanding properties, such as excellent tensile strength, controlled absorbency and a pleasant hand feel. Such parameters can be set precisely and reliably – for a variety of applications in different markets.

But that’s certainly not the only reason – after all, other manufacturers also offer good products.

Dr. Holger Poths: That’s true. But what makes WACKER unique is that, as one of the world's leading suppliers of binders for nonwovens, we offer our customers 360° support. No matter where in the world our customers are located, one of our Technical Competence Centers is always nearby. Providing customers with precisely the support they need. Be it with the development of new solutions or advice on how to use our products in their production processes. I know from my own experience that customers highly value this type of support and it is something that clearly differentiates us from other VAE binder suppliers.

Russell Thorpe: What makes us special is that we combine detailed product knowledge and application expertise in a unique way. On the one hand, we have many years of experience in the production of binders and additives for nonwovens. On the other, we have a large network of industry experts by our side: they have extensive nonwovens application expertise and can help our customers optimize the use of our products in their processes – it’s an unbeatable combination.

Dr. Holger Poths: At WACKER, we have always regarded collaboration and partnership as the key to success. Experience has shown: if we work closely with all our partners along the value chain to achieve common goals, then we can shape the future together.

What about sustainability in the nonwovens sector?

Russell Thorpe: Sustainability is firmly anchored in our corporate goals. This also applies to our product offering. On the one hand, we continually optimize our own energy and resource consumption to reduce our carbon footprint. On the other, we work to support our customers’ sustainability goals. For example, our VINNAPAS^® eco polymer dispersions are a low-carbon-emitting grade of product based on the mass balance approach. In the mass balance approach, fossil raw materials are replaced with renewable feedstocks in the value chain and are assigned to specific products. In this way, our certified VINNAPAS^® eco grade products can reduce the carbon footprint by up to 20 percent.

Where do you see potential for the future in the nonwovens sector?

Dr. Holger Poths: Our customers have made it clear that their ultimate goal is to source nonwoven grade binders from WACKER which are fossil free and compostable. It’s not an easy goal to achieve, but we are committed to not only working with our customers to develop solutions that meet their sustainability requirements, but to also delivering the proven performance they have come to expect from us. If we can do that, we will have taken a big step toward the future.

Always one step ahead

Click on the link to download our interactive PDF and our product overview of dispersions for nonwovens and technical textiles. Please note that the full functionality of the interactive PDFs is only available after downloading to your computer .