Liva to foray into menswear, home textiles segment

Aditya Birla’s fabric brand Liva is planning to enter men’s wear and home textiles segments. Currently, it operates only in the women’s apparel segment. Recently, Liva collaborated with FDCI to promote greener, sustainable fashion Liva Eco. This is Birla Cellulose’s enhanced version of Liva fabric made from wood-derived fibers. Birla Cellulose will also infuse about Rs 4,000 crores in its Vilayat factory in Gujarat to increase the capacity of fiber manufacturing. As of now, the domestic men’s wear segment has brands such as Mufti, Wrangler, Levi’s, Numero Uno, and Raymond brands, to name a few. Aditya Birla has in-house apparel brands such as Louis Philippe, Allen Solly, Van Heusen, Peter England and People which compete with these brands.

Aditya Birla has been in the textile industry from 1948. Started as Grasim Industries, the company now has brands Liva and Liva Eco as its subsidiaries. Birla is currently the world’s largest viscose manufacturing company. The company also acquired fashion chain Pantaloons from the Future Group and manages it. Recently, Grasim Industries signed an agreement to acquire 100 per cent equity shareholding of Soktas India. For an enterprise value of Rs 165 crores, subject to net debt and working capital adjustments as of the closing date, the company will be taking control from Soktas, which manages its operations from Turkey.