Our visit to Välinge’s facility in Viken, once again, made us realize that the company is the world’s most advanced R&D centre and IP company in flooring, furniture and surfaces. With its more than 1,850 granted patents and 350 global licensees, Välinge continues to develop technologies while helping the industry to grow.
Based in Viken, Sweden, Välinge Innovation is an R&D and IP company in the flooring and furniture industries. Founded by Darko Perván in 1993, Välinge pioneered the concept of glueless click flooring and changed the way people install and use floorings. Välinge’s worldwide-patented technology introduced a fast and easy way of installing floorboards mechanically, without using glue.
Today, Välinge’s technology base covers all fields related to floating flooring but also to other applications such as furniture and surfaces. Several new companies have been founded to specialize on customer support as well as different types of R&D and IP activities. Välinge’s patent portfolio is one of the most comprehensive in the flooring industry. During 2017, Välinge has obtained another 350 new granted patents. More than 200 of those patents are related to floor locking technologies such as 2G and 5G fold down locking systems for wood, laminate, powder based flooring and resilient flooring categories such as LVT, WPC and SPC.
Välinge is the proprietor of more than 1,850 granted and enforceable patents, and has expanded its IP portfolio significantly in the past years both within floor locking technology but also in other technology fields such as LVT/WPC/SPC, powder technology, digital printing, nano technology and locking systems for furniture in order to offer an extensive patent protection to its licensees.
During our visit, we were also impressed with the new factory in Viken. In 2015, a major investment was initiated by Pervanovo to build a high-tech large-volume factory for powder based floors with Woodura® and Nadura® surfaces in Viken. The € 50 million investment comprises a continuous pressing line from Hymmen, a sawing and profiling line from Paul and Homag, a surface treatment line from Bürkle and a packaging line from JB.
The powder technology is very successful and several potential licensees are interested in buying large volumes of flooring with Woodura® and Nadura® surfaces from Välinge – initially for introducing and evaluating the products while setting up their own production based on a Välinge license. Although Välinge recently installed a second production line for powder based floors, additional capacity was required to meet the demand from existing and potential licensees and partners. With the new acquisition, Välinge will have an installed press capacity of 7 million m2 at the facility in Viken, Sweden.
Välinge currently provides extensive support to its licensees to help improve production efficiency and quality. A few examples are prototype production, training/education and special activities. A considerable amount of Välinge’s revenues is reinvested in the development of new innovative products and cost efficient production technologies that further supports profitable growth for its licensees.