Esquel Group


Esquel Group is a Chinese textile manufacturing company. It is the world's largest woven shirt maker, producing about 100 million shirts annually.

History

The family owned business was founded in 1978 by family patriarch Yang Yuan-loong. The opening of China that year had according to one of Yang's daughters led to the decision to establish the company. In July 2020, the Bureau of Industry and Security placed a Hong Kong-based subsidiary of Esquel Group on its "Entity List" for alleged use of forced labor of Uyghurs in Xinjiang.

Facilities

Most of the company's manufacturing facilities are in China. It has other facilities in Malaysia, Mauritius, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.
Its operations in China like the rest of the textile industry in China have faced the constant pressure of rising labor costs and stricter environmental regulation. The company has strategy of upgrading or opening new facilities with better automation to counter the competitive pressure of rising wages. This strategy was noted by the South China Morning Post as different from some other competitors which sought to diversify operations by moving to other countries with lower labor costs.