Chemical company Nagase Chemtex has developed the RS-IAG series, a special resin that can be used to reproduce detailed 3D printed data, and will market it for applications such as 3D printer-made mid soles for shoes. While the manufacturing of shoes using a 3D printer has the advantages of increased design freedom of the sole, small-quantity, high-mix production, and reduced...
Shoe manufacturer Achilles is supporting Akitoshi Moriguchi in his push to break a Guinness World Record for rope skipping. Moriguchi, a professional rope skipper, is aiming to be the first in the world to achieve eight revolutions in a single skip. And to support this endeavor, Achilles is providing him with its Hyper Jumper shoes, which utilize Acrofoam – a...
Toyoda Gosei Co. Ltd. (TYO:7282) recently announced its development of Smart Insoles, a new type of shoe insole that incorporates the company’s e-Rubber sensors to obtain data on foot pressure as the wearer moves. The company has now also started shipping samples of these insoles to a golf school operated by Mizuno Corp (TYO:8022). A next-gen rubber that moves when...
Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. recently announced that it has been working with footwear brand Skechers USA Inc. to develop new footwear. Outsoles making use of Goodyear’s rubber technology are being utilized in a range of Skechers products. These outsoles incorporate various Goodyear technologies, such as a special polymer that includes renewable soybean oil. As a result, the outsoles provide...
Bridgestone Sports Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of Bridgestone Corp. (TYO:5108), has announced that a line of spikeless golf shoes under its Tour B series achieved a major sales landmark over Sept. 10–16, becoming the week’s top-selling over-the-counter line of spikeless golf shoes in Japan. This comes as Bridgestone has applied technologies from its tires to the new line of shoes,...
Japan’s market for footwear saw its overall supply rise by 1.7 percent year-on-year for 2017, reaching a total of 704.06 million pairs of shoes for the year. This represents the first increase to the figure in four years, as well as the country’s first time in three years to break through the 700 million mark. Total domestic production – including...
