Interview with Enrico Delmastro, technician of our R&D department

Enrico Delmastro is a young technician and member of the R&D department of our Group, a crucial function for a company, as ours, which is oriented towards sustainable innovation.

Let’s hear about his work in R&D and the path which brought him to work for our Group.

Hello, Enrico. What was your educational path before coming to Marchi & Fildi? Did your training at ITS TAM give you a useful background for working in R&D?

I graduated from the agricultural high school in Vercelli and immediately started working in an open-end spinning company, where I was responsible for the preparation for carding. After six months, I realised that the sector fascinated me and I wanted to study it in depth, so I enrolled at ITS TAM Biella. I chose the Processi tessili, innovazione e sostenibilità course which enabled me to understand all the different steps, from the fibre to the finishing, from the weaving to the knitting, to become Senior Technician in spinning and finishing.
During my second year, I did a curricular internship at Marchi & Fildi in the Research and Development department. In 2019, before the end of the internship, I was offered the possibility of a job here, an offer which I was very happy to accept.

What does your job consist of? Which other roles and areas of the company do you liaise with?

I am mainly involved in the programming of the machinery for quality control, I check the quality of the semi-processed and finished products, and sometimes I verify the functioning of the production in order to guarantee previously agreed delivery times. I work in a team whose job it is to guarantee the development of samples and production lots in this department, while coordinating with colleagues within the department as well as with the head of production, both in terms of product quality and of production and delivery timing.

Tell us about some of the projects you are involved in and which have interested you in particular.

Right from the start when I joined the company, I greatly appreciated the variety of the projects which are often real challenges, with which we are constantly faced. At the moment I am looking especially to the future and the aspect which fascinates me most is the possibility of working in an environment such as MagnoLab, the network of companies for innovation, of which the Group is a member. I’m looking forward to interfacing with different companies, to expanding my knowledge also in relation to the other steps in the supply chain, to tackling increasingly ambitious projects and, why not, to improving the standards of the products.

You are part of a team which works with a huge variety of fibres and end uses. Which value/challenge does this represent for your professional development?

The part of my job that I like most is the opportunity of working with numerous fibres and blending them appropriately to obtain a quality yarn with certain performance. Working in the R&D department, I can follow all of the development and production processes and I can see the end result with my own eyes.

In these years, I have had the opportunity to get to know a number of fibre types, starting from those which are better-known and more traditional, which I studied during my training, to the more innovative ones, developed by the partners with which our Group collaborates. Some less well-known fibres, such as arctic or kapok, have increased my knowledge in view of future challenges, and not necessarily for the current production uses.

In addition, as a result of my career path, I have gained good knowledge of aramid fibres, which is at the heart of the Filidea Technical Yarns developments. In this setting, I have also had the privilege of discovering from close up a niche in the textile sector which I hadn’t looked at during my training. The element which is most stimulating for me about the technical yarns is the end use of suits for Formula 1 drivers and for fire fighters.

The innovation of sustainable fibres and yarns is the future of the textile world. What is your vision? In your opinion, where will R&D go in the future?

Working with recycled materials is simultaneously a challenge and an opportunity. The everyday objective in R&D is to create products of the highest standards using recycled raw materials and preserving one’s know-how and competence, thanks to the team working on this topic who firmly believe in this work. Constant investment over the years has enabled the development of products and production skills in terms of circular economies which have become the flagship of the Group.

For the future, being part of the MagnoLab project will represent a prospect to develop and increase the knowledge of all of us, as well as being a motor for the supply chain.
I would very much like to be an active part of the developments made by MagnoLab and our Group, in particular those which will lead to optimising consumption and reducing environmental impacts.