Advanced Functional Fabrics of America (AFFOA) announced the selection of Loomia and Z-Polymers as the first two Product Accelerator for Functional Fabrics (PAFF) program awardees. This first-of-its-kind initiative is designed to enable organizations to leverage AFFOA’s capabilities and personnel, at no direct cost, to increase the speed to market of Advanced Functional Fabric (AFF) products for commercial and defense applications.
The PAFF program is specifically tailored for companies that are in the advanced stages of commercializing an advanced fiber or fabric product or process. With a performance period of up to 12 months, the program was created to help organizations fill the gaps in their product/process development processes and accelerate their time to market.
“Most companies working on advanced functional fabrics, whether they are startups or well-established organizations, have gaps in their product development process, and finding the expertise or training teams to fill those gaps can be quite costly and time-consuming. We have worked very hard here at AFFOA to create a resource with decades of experience, cutting-edge technologies, and unique capabilities that the advanced textile industry needs. And now, with the PAFF program, they access these resources at no added cost and can get their product to market faster.” shared AFFOA CEO Sasha Stolyarov. “We plan on conducting several rounds of the PAFF program and are excited about its potential impact on the domestic advanced fabrics ecosystem.”