NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / September 29, 2025 / Europe has long been the beating heart of global fashion, but now it intends to become the brain as well. While designers in Paris and Milan set the trends on the runway, the continent’s regulators have been setting just as aggressive targets behind the scenes. The EU’s Digital Product Passport rules, ESG mandates, and Green Deal initiatives all point to one thing: traceability is no longer optional. It’s the law. And the brands that want to thrive under this regime need more than ambition. They need proof.
That’s where the partnership between SMX (NASDAQ:SMX) and CETI, the European Center for Innovative Textiles, takes center stage. Based in Lille, CETI is a hub of R&D firepower, and SMX is bringing the molecular-level tech that finally turns recycling and authentication into measurable realities. By embedding invisible fingerprints into fibers and tying them to blockchain passports, they’re not talking about traceability in theory. They’re operationalizing it at an industrial scale. This isn’t about testing samples in a lab. It’s about creating market-ready fabrics that carry their credentials from the moment they leave the loom.
The implications are massive. Lille is now positioned as Europe’s launch pad for textile circularity, an epicenter where compliance meets competitiveness. The brands that plug into this system won’t just be checking regulatory boxes; they will also be leveraging the system to drive growth. They’ll be setting the global standard, exporting textiles with built-in trust that can cross borders, enter finance systems, and hold value in resale markets. Counterfeiters, once experts at slipping through loopholes, will find themselves locked out entirely. Europe’s message is clear: if it doesn’t carry proof, it doesn’t carry value.
Europe’s Competitive Edge
The Green Deal and Digital Product Passport requirements are no longer distant talking points. They’re active levers reshaping how textiles are produced, sold, and financed. For companies that comply, the rewards are enormous. Verified recycled content can fetch higher margins, sustainability reports suddenly become bulletproof, and ESG-linked financing starts flowing with lower risk premiums. CETI’s pilot lines turn compliance into a competitive edge, and SMX’s molecular markers make sure no counterfeit can piggyback off the system. In a sector where billions are lost to fake fabrics and fraudulent claims, that’s not just progress. It’s a paradigm shift.
Luxury fashion will benefit, but so will sportswear, industrial fabrics, and technical textiles. By embedding trust directly into the material, the entire ecosystem gains a multiplier effect. Supply chains move faster, regulators have enforceable data, and consumers gain confidence that the clothes on their backs are what they claim to be. Proof becomes Europe’s new export, not just the fabrics themselves. That’s how you win markets.
Platforms like eBay show why this matters globally. They already have rules in place to fight fakes, but rules aren’t enough without the tools to enforce them at speed and scale. Scanners tied to molecular markers would make their efforts airtight, instantly authenticating a watch, a handbag, or a jacket before it ever hits the buyer’s doorstep. Europe’s proof-first model is the playbook, and platforms everywhere will be forced to follow.
The New Standard
The counterfeit industry has thrived on gaps, exploiting weak enforcement and opaque supply chains. But Europe just closed the gap. Lille’s CETI, armed with SMX technology, isn’t running pilots for show. It’s demonstrating to the world that circularity can be verifiable, profitable, and enforceable. The EU’s leadership on this front isn’t just bureaucratic muscle. It’s the foundation of a new global textile economy, one where every fiber carries a passport and every recycled material commands its true price.
Fashion has always been about staying ahead, but this is different. This is about Europe using regulation and technology as weapons to protect its competitiveness and ensure standards are met, while simultaneously burying counterfeiters in the rubble of their old business model.
From luxury brands to industrial suppliers, the rules of the game just changed. And the scoreboard isn’t counting logos anymore. It’s counting the proof that SMX and CETI can provide.
About SMX
As global businesses face new and complex challenges relating to carbon neutrality and meeting new governmental and regional regulations and standards, SMX is able to offer players along the value chain access to its marking, tracking, measuring and digital platform technology to transition more successfully to a low-carbon economy.
Forward-Looking Statements
The information in this press release includes “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements regarding expectations, hopes, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future. In addition, any statements that refer to projections, forecasts or other characterizations of future events or circumstances, including any underlying assumptions, are forward-looking statements. The words “anticipate,” “believe,” “contemplate,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “intends,” “may,” “will,” “might,” “plan,” “possible,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “should,” “would” and similar expressions may identify forward-looking statements, but the absence of these words does not mean that a statement is not forward-looking. Forward-looking statements in this press release may include, for example: matters relating to the Company’s fight against abusive and possibly illegal trading tactics against the Company’s stock; successful launch and implementation of SMX’s joint projects with manufacturers and other supply chain participants of gold, steel, rubber and other materials; changes in SMX’s strategy, future operations, financial position, estimated revenues and losses, projected costs, prospects and plans; SMX’s ability to develop and launch new products and services, including its planned Plastic Cycle Token; SMX’s ability to successfully and efficiently integrate future expansion plans and opportunities; SMX’s ability to grow its business in a cost-effective manner; SMX’s product development timeline and estimated research and development costs; the implementation, market acceptance and success of SMX’s business model; developments and projections relating to SMX’s competitors and industry; and SMX’s approach and goals with respect to technology. These forward-looking statements are based on information available as of the date of this press release, and current expectations, forecasts and assumptions, and involve a number of judgments, risks and uncertainties. Accordingly, forward-looking statements should not be relied upon as representing views as of any subsequent date, and no obligation is undertaken to update forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date they were made, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as may be required under applicable securities laws. As a result of a number of known and unknown risks and uncertainties, actual results or performance may be materially different from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Some factors that could cause actual results to differ include: the ability to maintain the listing of the Company’s shares on Nasdaq; changes in applicable laws or regulations; any lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on SMX’s business; the ability to implement business plans, forecasts, and other expectations, and identify and realize additional opportunities; the risk of downturns and the possibility of rapid change in the highly competitive industry in which SMX operates; the risk that SMX and its current and future collaborators are unable to successfully develop and commercialize SMX’s products or services, or experience significant delays in doing so; the risk that the Company may never achieve or sustain profitability; the risk that the Company will need to raise additional capital to execute its business plan, which may not be available on acceptable terms or at all; the risk that the Company experiences difficulties in managing its growth and expanding operations; the risk that third-party suppliers and manufacturers are not able to fully and timely meet their obligations; the risk that SMX is unable to secure or protect its intellectual property; the possibility that SMX may be adversely affected by other economic, business, and/or competitive factors; and other risks and uncertainties described in SMX’s filings from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
EMAIL: info@securitymattersltd.com
SOURCE: SMX (Security Matters)
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