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• The adidas Futurecraft Biofabric features include being 100% biodegradable through a fully natural process
• adidas has partnered with AMSilk for the first premium innovation footwear made using silk biopolymers
• Concept shoe unveiled at renowned Biofabricate Conference in New York 

adidas has today unveiled the world’s first performance shoe made using Biosteel® fiber – a replication of natural silk – at the Biofabricate Conference in New York.

The adidas Futurecraft Biofabric prototype shoe features an upper made from 100% Biosteel® fiber, a nature-based and completely biodegradable high-performance fiber, developed by the German biotech company AMSilk. The material offers a unique combination of properties that are crucial in performance, such as being 15% lighter in weight than conventional synthetic fibers as well as having the potential to be the strongest fully natural material available.

In addition, Biosteel® fiber also provides a far more sustainable offering, with it being 100% biodegradable in a fully natural process. This continues adidas’ journey of sustainable innovation – from a starting point of virgin plastics, to recycled plastics, to its partnership with Parley for the Oceans and now a totally new frontier of investing in solutions that leverage science and nature as an integral part of innovation.

The shoe was unveiled at the renowned Biofabricate Conference in New York as adidas and AMSilk announce a partnership that will explore the use of Biosteel® fiber in performance products on a larger scale.

James Carnes, Vice President of Strategy Creation at adidas, said:

“In a year of ground-breaking innovations from adidas, the announcement of our partnership with AMSilk – and the unveiling of the adidas Futurecraft Biofabric shoe – is another step in our commitment to redefining the sports industry.”

This concept represents premium innovation. By using Biosteel® fiber in our products, we have achieved an unrivalled level of sustainability. We are moving beyond closed loop and into an infinite loop – or even no loop at all. This is a pioneering stride forward beyond sustainability into a new territory of bionic innovation.

JAMES CARNES, VICE PRESIDENT OF STRATEGY CREATION AT ADIDAS

Jens Klein, CEO of AMSilk, said:

“The sports shoes which have been developed together with adidas are the first products worldwide with a high-performance material made of nature-identical silk biopolymers.”

With this development we are setting new standards regarding the functionality of renewable textiles.

JENS KLEIN, CEO OF AMSILK

The release of the adidas Futurecraft Biofabric shoe comes in a year where adidas has released a series of products that have pushed the boundaries of sneaker innovation. These include the Futurecraft Tailored Fibre, which utilised revolutionary manufacturing techniques to enable unique footwear designs and the Futurecraft M.F.G., the first product to be created at adidas’ industry-changing SPEEDFACTORY facility.

These cutting-edge product developments have been complemented by adidas’ commitment to sustainability, with its relationship with Parley for the Oceans having led to the release of the first mass-produced footwear created using Parley Ocean Plastic, the UltraBOOST Uncaged Parley.

News Courtesy: adidas group

As a sports company we know that Speed wins. That’s why we defined Speed as one of the key choices of our strategic business plan ‘Creating the New’. With the adidas SPEEDFACTORY we are revolutionising the industry. It’s a constantly changing world out there and our consumers always want the latest and newest product – and they want it now. That’s what adidas SPEEDFACTORY delivers, starting right here in Germany, with best-in-class German technology.

HERBERT HAINER, CEO OF THE ADIDAS GROUP

The SPEEDFACTORY initiative heralds a new era in footwear creation. This flexible model challenges the idea of centralised production and makes product close to where the consumer is. It opens doors to creation of product completely unique to the fit and functional needs of consumers, through a combination of the craft of shoe making and cutting-edge technology.

“Every day our teams come together to bring speed to life, and with the adidas SPEEDFACTORY, we have a game changer in our hands. It enables us to combine speed in manufacturing with the flexibility to rethink conventional processes. Our goal is to give consumers what they want when they want it,” Glenn Bennett, Executive Board Member of the adidas Group responsible for Global Operations, pointed out.

It’s a new era in footwear crafting – with greater precision, unique design opportunities and high-performance. Products of tomorrow are going to look different to what we have today.

GLENN BENNETT, EXECUTIVE BOARD MEMBER OF THE ADIDAS GROUP RESPONSIBLE FOR GLOBAL OPERATIONS

The pilot adidas SPEEDFACTORY in Ansbach was set up in December 2015 in partnership with industry experts to provide a testing ground for this trailblazing model. The first pairs of high-performance footwear to come out of the adidas SPEEDFACTORY will be revealed later this year. The large-scale commercial production facility will be operated by adidas’ strategic partner Oechsler Motion GmbH across an area of 4,600 m2. With best-in-class German engineering, adidas is all geared to bring Speed to the consumers, before bringing production to the US next.

UPDATE (AUGUST 10TH, 2016):

Please click here to learn more about the first U.S.-based adidas SPEEDFACTORY in metro Atlanta.

News Courtesy: The Financial Times

• The adidas Group removes plastic shopping bags from its own retail stores
• In total, the move will eliminate approximately 70 million plastic shopping bags per year
• This is yet another step taken by the adidas Group on its journey to become a more sustainable company

To celebrate Earth Day, and to underscore its ongoing commitment to sustainability, the adidas Group announced today plastic shopping bags will be removed from its own retail stores globally. The switch to paper bags will be implemented immediately, with Russia and Kazakhstan following in June 2016.

Additionally, over the last year, the adidas Group has worked closely with its partners, resulting in the vast majority of its franchisees committing to paper bags by the end of June 2016.

This means every year the adidas Group will eliminate approximately 70 million plastic shopping bags across more than 14,000 retail stores globally. This translates to 3 million plastic shopping bags in the United States and more than 2 million plastic bags in Germany.

Phasing out shopping plastic bags is part of our wider effort to constantly increase the use of more sustainable materials in our production, products and stores, as we recently announced with our newly launched 2020 Sustainability Strategy ‘Sport needs a space’.

ROLAND AUSCHEL, MEMBER OF THE EXECUTIVE BOARD, RESPONSIBLE FOR GLOBAL SALES

“However, there is even more to it than that. Our store staff has been trained on the importance of taking consumers on this journey with us; we will therefore ask consumers if they really need a paper bag before we give one away. Reducing the number of bags we produce also means minimising our environmental footprint and helps us to become an even more sustainable company,” says Roland Auschel, Member of the Executive Board, responsible for Global Sales.

The plastic shopping bag phase-out initiative started one year ago, when the company announced its partnership with Parley for the Oceans. As a founding member, adidas supports Parley for the Oceans in its education and communication efforts, as well as its comprehensive Ocean Plastic Programme (A.I.R., Avoid, Intercept, and Redesign) that intends to end plastic pollution of the oceans. On top of phasing out plastic bags, the adidas Group has taken concrete steps to reduce its use of virgin plastic such as:

• Ended the use of plastic microbeads across all body care products by December 31, 2015.
• Eliminating plastic bottles in meetings at its headquarters in Herzogenaurach, Germany as of Q3 2015.

The adidas Group’s programme is regularly recognised by leading socially responsible investment rating agencies, such as the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices and the FTSE4Good Index. In 2015, for the 16th consecutive time, the adidas Group was included in the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices. Again, at the beginning of 2016, the adidas Group ranked fifth among ‘The Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World’, as announced by media and investment advisory company Corporate Knights at the World Economic Forum.

News Courtesy: The Financial Times