Nonwovens company focusing on nanotechnology and composites for the future

When the Hollingsworth and Vose families started their business in 1843 pounding old fishing ropes into pulp to make paper to bind books, they probably didn’t expect that 164 years later the company would be creating nanofiber filtration media.

Through the decades, Hollingsworth & Vose Co. (H&V) has used innovation, strong customer partnerships, its broad range of process technologies, and R&D expertise to differentiate itself as a leading global supplier of technically advanced filtration media, battery separator materials and industrial nonwovens.

From its start extracting papermaking fiber (hemp) from manila rope off fishing boats in Boston, to developing filter media used in respirators during World War II to protect the military, H&V has earned a reputation for drawing on its multiple technologies to design products to meet customers’ specific requirements.  

Its long history of innovation includes pioneering developments in electrical insulating paper, microfiberglass and meltblown filter media, cellulosic filter media, wet-laid nonwovens, diskette liners and nanofiber technologies.

Today, H&V is ranked 13th among the world’s leading nonwovens suppliers, according to industry reports. The company’s filter media and materials are used in a wide range of industries, with engine filtration as its largest market.

Other applications for its products include filtration media used in cleanrooms producing plasma televisions and semiconductors, batteries, gaskets, fuel cells, HVAC systems, and window treatments, as well as liquid filter applications such as pool and spas.

The growing use of automobiles in Asia has created increased demand for its engine filtration products and led the company to open a new plant in Suzhou, China.

Despite the changes over the years, the East Walpole, Mass.-based company remains family owned, with Val Hollingsworth, a fifth generation family member, at its helm as president and CEO.

Hollingsworth visits the company’s dozen plants in the Americas, Europe and Asia at least once a year to talk to employees about the company’s progress and knows most of the 1,500 workers by name.

“The employees take a lot of pride in the longevity of the company and the fact that it’s still in the family and growing,” said Dave Healey, H&V’s director of synthetic technology. “We’re run like a family organization.”

A Fine Fiber Future
Health concerns, environmental sustainability and the desire for energy efficiency continue to propel growth in nonwovens used in the filtration segment to improve air quality.   

“Filters are also more efficient than they were 10-15 years ago,” Healey said. “The trend is to look at capturing finer particles that have been found to be more detrimental to human health, which leads to nanofibers. There’s also a trend for more filtration at lower pressure drops to use less energy.”

Future growth areas for the company include nanofibers, composites and synthetics. The company is creating composites utilizing its numerous fibrous web technologies including cellulose, glass, carbon and synthetic fibers. The combination of these technologies yields advanced materials with performance benefits for the final user that include increased performance and longer service life.

With a new technology platform and collaborative process called HVision™, H&V expects to accelerate the development and commercialization of breakthrough products and improve quality. The company recently introduced its first two products using this technology platform:

• The PerForm™    next- generation    High Efficiency    Particulate Air    (HEPA)/Ultra Low    Penetration Air    (ULPA) filter media    for clean room    applications; and

• NanoWave™,    a patented,    extended-    surface, high-loft,    all- synthetic    media. Designed    for the American    Society of Heating    Refrigerating and    Air Conditioning    Engineers    (ASHRAE) bag filter    market, this media    boasts three times    the dirt-holding    capacity of    conventional    media.

“This R&D platform will provide customers with innovative products that offer new standards of excellence for the performance characteristics that matter most,” said Hollingsworth.

And after all these years, that’s exactly what the industry and its customers have come to expect from Hollingsworth & Vose.