On Thursday, October 3, the 27th INTERCLEAN conference will take place in Prague’s OREA Hotel Pyramida. It is the only event of its kind in the Czech Republic intended for professionals from the field of textile care. Among the key topics of this year’s meeting are the issues of water recycling, energy savings, and the issue of digitization and new technologies. The results of the laundry and cleaning market research study will also be presented. The event is organized by the Czech Association for Textile Care (APAC).
The INTERCLEAN conference, offering a platform for meeting professionals from the field of textile care, is returning to the capital after five years. The participants of the 27th year will be welcomed on Thursday, October 3 at the OREA Hotel Pyramida Prague. This year’s program once again provides space for discussion of current industry topics in the form of energy savings, water recycling, digitization and technological innovations. There will also be a question about popular AI, which is used in the industry to analyze and optimize the life cycle of textiles.
“The pressure to recycle water, reduce its consumption, reduce the energy intensity of the washing and cleaning process and monitor the life cycle of textiles is currently resonating throughout the industry in Europe. For this reason, it is necessary to open a debate on the topic of categorization of our field so that it is clearly identifiable among others and so that we can effectively argue during negotiations about its regulation and subsidies,” explains Jana Puskáčová, president of APAC.
This year’s conference will also feature the traditional presentation of the results of a professional study, which APAC commissions to be processed every year. “This year we focused on researching the laundry and cleaning market in the Czech Republic. In recent years, our industry has faced turbulent situations related to the coronavirus pandemic and later the energy crisis. We are therefore interested in how the market has changed, what it needs and what challenges it faces,”explains Monika Býmová, executive director of APAC.
Discussion on AI, economy and fires
Among the speakers at the conference, Jan Vejmělek, chief economist and head of economic and strategic research at Komerční banka, will speak about the prospects of the Czech economy in a global environment. Through Alexandra Belingerová‘s contribution, the aforementioned issue of artificial intelligence will also be given space. “The presentation will be devoted to the impact of AI on current business. It will bring closer the fundamental opportunities that new technologies offer to entrepreneurs,” adds the founder of Databig and Technology Entrepreneur of the Year 2023.
The current topic of fires in laundry facilities will also be discussed. “Fires in laundries are unfortunately an increasingly common phenomenon. Among their three most common causes are technical faults on machines, human error and a chemical factor. New innovations in fire protection could reduce the risk of these unfortunate events in the future,” says Nikola Kašparová, APAC representative for European affairs.
Eleven supplier companies will also present themselves at the event, including Christeyns, which plans to present modern concepts for more economical washing as part of the conference. “At this year’s INTERCLEAN, we would like to focus on presenting our latest low-temperature work technologies and energy and water saving processes. Furthermore, we want to present new products, thanks to which it is possible to get rid of problems with hard-to-remove stains on laundry,”outlines Patrik Žila from the Christeyns company.
The most visited industry conference
INTERCLEAN is among the world’s most visited conferences in the field of textile care. “If we were to look at this question through the lens of the number of inhabitants of the given country, with an annual attendance of around 170 participants, they even clearly win. For comparison, around 170 visitors arrived at the industry conference in Great Britain last year, 250 in Germany and 200 in the USA,” adds Jana Puskáčová.
Czech TV presenter Veronika Kadeřábková will guide visitors through this year’s conference. The evening raffle will be joined by actor, entertainer and director Jakub Kohák.
More information about the conference itself and its program can be found at this link.
Czech Association for Textile Care