Germany's textile machinery industry shows interest in tapping the huge Asean markets which are attractive because of the huge business potential inherent in the region besides focusing on China and India due to the sheer size of these two markets, said Elgar Straub, managing director of the German Machinery Manufacturers' Association.

Germany's sewing and garment technology exports worldwide in 2013 amounted to 466.26 million euro (RM1.9 billion) and were the third largest supplier of sewing and garment technology, trailing behind China with 1.679 billion euro (RM6.9 billion) and Japan at 537 million euro (RM2.2 billion).

The biggest markets for German sewing and garment technology worldwide in 2013 were the United States, India, Turkey, Italy, France, China,Russia, Poland and Hong Kong.

Messe Frankfurt, which organises the Heimtextil Show, the world's largest home-textile show in Frankfurt, also made a strong pitch for the forthcoming Techtextil fair to be held in Frankfurt from May 4 to 7, 2015.

Messe Frankfurt's Michael Jaenecke, the brand management director for technical textiles and textile processing, claimed that there had been very strong demand for space from exhibitors.

Parallel to the Techtextil, Messe Frankfurt is also organising the twin sister fair, Texprocess, a dedicated show for textile and flexible materials processing.

Jaenecke maintained that while the Techtextil had existed for many years, the Texprocess event, launched in 2011, had grown exponentially and the fair organiser was holding the two shows for four days instead of the 3-day run, as in the past.

Messe Frankfurt vice-president for textiles and textile technology Olaf Schmidt told Bernama that 95% of the exhibition space was sold out although there were still four months to go before the start of the show.

Techtextil is expected to attract a good turnout of exhibitors from Asia, including Asean. A number of Asian countries are planning to set up national pavilions at the Techtextil Fair to provide a common roof to exhibitors and buyers interested in sealing up deals at the event.

The ongoing Heimtextil show has attracted a large turnout of Asian exhibitors, led by China with 513 exhibitors followed by India (390), Pakistan (219), Turkey (159),Taiwan (60), Hong Kong (31) and Bangladesh (20).

For the first time, Malaysia has a single debutant with the participation of a Selangor-based Fennex Sdn Bhd which was doing good business at the show with a steady stream of buyers visiting its stand.