Thailand Positioned to Lead Asian Sports Textile Innovation
Thailand has potential to become Southeast Asia's sports textile innovation hub, leveraging its biomass and electronics strengths as global patent applications in the sector surge at 9% annually with opportunities for new players despite do
The Department of Intellectual Property has released a patent trend analysis on innovative sports textiles, highlighting Thailand's potential to build on its strengths in biomass and electronics to become a regional manufacturing and innovation hub for sports textiles in Southeast Asia.
On 22 August 2025, Ormorn Saaptwitthidharma, Director-General of the Department of Intellectual Property, revealed that analysis of global patent data from 2007 to 2024 identified more than 19,347 patent families in sports textile technology. Applications surged from 391 families in 2007 to a peak of 1,966 families in 2021, with an average annual growth rate of 9.0%, encompassing innovations from next-generation synthetic fibres and sensor-embedded fabrics to advanced recycling processes, reflecting the breadth and depth of innovation in the sports textile supply chain.
Saaptwitthidharma stated that global competition in this industry is not confined to traditional textile manufacturers but has expanded into cross-industry competition, with technology firms, specialty chemical companies, and wearable tech startups all playing a role. Patent ownership is highly fragmented, with the largest patent holder, Aladdin Manufacturing (a major functional fibre and polyester producer from the United States), holding 192 patent families—just 1% of the total. This is followed by Nanya Plastics from Taiwan with 180 families and Sanko Tekstil from Turkey with 150 families, demonstrating that no single player dominates the market and leaving space for new players, including Thai entrepreneurs, to influence the technological direction.
Geographically, China leads decisively in patent volume with 7,086 families (37.7% of the total), consistent with its status as the world's largest textile manufacturing base, combined with surging R&D investment over the past decade and a domestic market that drives intellectual property creation.
The United States ranks second with 3,415 families (18.2%), followed by the European Patent Convention member group (covering 40 countries, including 27 EU members and 13 non-EU members) with 1,868 families (9.9%). The United States and European Patent Convention members focus on high-value technology leveraging electronics ecosystems.
Notably, emerging market countries like India, with 222 patent families, are climbing significantly, demonstrating that nations now compete through technological development and product differentiation rather than production costs alone, seeking competitive advantages that meet evolving consumer demands.
The Director-General explained that sports textile innovation can be divided into three major technology groups: 1) Breathable and compression fabric technology, the largest group at 7,974 families (approximately 39.5% of all patents in this field). This category is approaching maturity but continues steady incremental development with an average annual growth rate of 7.0%, covering moisture management, breathability, and compression control technologies.
