Working closely with the United States Special Forces, Marine Corps, Army, Navy and Air Force at Army Natick Soldier Systems Center and other bases across the country, we continue to develop a variety of remarkably innovative fabrics that are helping to keep the U.S. Military the best-equipped in the world.

Most recently, Malden Mills Industries Inc is proud to announce that it has secured funding in the 2003 Department of Defense budget to supply Polartec® products and research and development services to the United States military. The $12.4 million dollars in funding will insure delivery of $11.4 million dollars of the Polartec® components that are the foundation of the Army, Marine Corps and Special Operations Forces’ Extended Cold Weather Clothing System (ECWCS). Polartec® gear has seen extensive use in Afghanistan during this past year and has performed extremely well under the harshest of combat conditions. Clothing items manufactured out of Polartec® fabrics have been awarded a 97% approval rating in field testing by the U.S. Military, the highest rating ever recorded for a piece of issued gear.

Included in the 2003 budget is $1 million dollars for the research and development of Rugged Textile Electronic Garments for use in Combat Casualty Care. The funding will allow Malden Mills to apply it’s expertise in the emerging field of electronic textiles to create lightweight, robust, machine washable next-to-skin garments that provide remote physiological monitoring during combat and operations. This will be accomplished by developing an advanced Polartec® fabric technology that incorporates sensors that monitor respiration, pulse rate, skin temperature and blood pressure. Discrete antennas will then transmit this data to medics behind the line of battle. This technology will allow medics to perform remote triage determining who needs first aid- saving lives in the process. Malden Mills’ partners on this project include Foster-Miller of Waltham, Ma, Exponent of Irving, CA and Eastern Carolina University.

The future looks even more promising as our partnerships continue to generate exciting new technological and performance breakthroughs.  Combat Casualty Care electronic sensing materials, flame resistant fabrics, superior moisture management, and insulation garment systems are some of our developmental projects with the U.S. Military. Stay tuned for updates on these and other programs.