Flying first class with Swiss textiles: ever wondered, as you were jet setting around the world, which company was responsible for the material you were sitting on? The most likely candidate is tucked away in Canton Bern, where the world's leading supplier of airline industry textiles, Lantal, is headquartered. Swiss News met with CEO Urs Rickenbacher on the ground in Langenthal.

Swiss News › Nbr. 2009, January 2009

Author: Mirza, Faryal

Position:: BUSINESS PROFILE

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BUSINESS PROFILE

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Flying first class with Swiss textiles: ever wondered, as you were jet setting around the world, which company was responsible for the material you were sitting on? The most likely candidate is tucked away in Canton Bern, where the world's leading supplier of airline industry textiles, Lantal, is headquartered. Swiss News met with CEO Urs Rickenbacher on the ground in Langenthal.

In the beginning, there was cheese. The forerunner of today's thriving airline textile business opened its doors in 1886 to produce linen wrappings for Emmental cheese wheels as they matured.

By the 1950s, the son of the company's then owner tried to persuade his father that the future lay in a different sort of textile, aimed at a different type of customer. Father and son (of the Baumann family) did not see eye...

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