Companies

FAIST Voices: meet AMF Safety Shoes

Sep 21, 2026 Portugal

As part of the FAIST project, Portuguese technical and safety footwear manufacturer AFM Safety Shoes has committed to developing automation-focused solutions that prioritise efficiency and sustainability

The FAIST (Agile, Intelligent, Sustainable and Technological Factory) consortium brought together over 40 Portuguese partners across footwear and leather goods, technology providers and research centres.

From June 2022 to June 2026, the programme channelled about 50 million euros of investment into projects that modernised the industry to sharpen its international competitiveness.

AMF Under Focus

Founded in 1999 by Albano Fernandes, AMF Safety Shoes started out as a company that assembled footwear components for other footwear companies. A turning point came in 2005 when the decision was made to specialise in the production of technical and safety footwear, with the launch of the Toworkfor brand.

“For me, it was like this: there were hundreds of fashion footwear companies. There were only two safety footwear companies. In my mind, it made more sense because there would be fewer competitors and less competition”, Albano Fernandes recalls.

Today, the company is renowned for its ongoing commitment to innovation, combining design, comfort, safety and technology to cater for the mid-to-high end of the market. This has been achieved by prioritising differentiation through patents, exclusive materials, and partnerships with universities and technology centres.

Under FAIST

Within the FAIST framework, AMF, together with DCSI, developed automation-focused solutions for technical footwear production that prioritise efficiency and sustainability based on direct injection for outsoles and intelligent logistics.

These include a technologically advanced production line that combines multiple manufacturing steps into a single injection-based cell, reducing the need for manual operations such as glueing or trimming the sole after injection. The aim is to ensure consistent, high-quality assembly while reducing dependence on manual labour.

Work has also been carried out on the industrial-scale production of layered footwear using a patented process to make it economically viable. “From an industrial perspective, their process is not very profitable”, said the CEO of AMF. “However, with the support of various entities and Portuguese technology, we will create a process that is profitable and eliminates most of the sewing operations. It’s almost as if we put the ingredients in and the finished shoe comes out”.

At the same time, AMF transformed their shop floor and organization process to be able to accommodate all the new developments under this program. Preparation of the physical installations and a change in the management and organization was crucial to get the most of these solutions.

Outcomes

The new line increased significantly their daily capacity of direct injection outsoles, and reduced the need for several manual operations, significantly increasing quality and decreasing variations in the product with less interventions for remanufacturing and repair. The efficiency of the new processes is still being assessed, but from a preliminar evaluation is understandable that significant gains are being observed.

Visit AMF Safety Shoes website for more information.

Explore more about the FAIST project here.

Image Credits: eco.sapo.pt; portugueseshoes.pt