German sporting goods company Adidas will grow faster than U.S. archrival Nike in 2015, Adidas Chief Executive Herbert Hainer told German daily Boersen-Zeitung.

He said it was important for the company to aim for sustainable and continuous growth rather than the highest turnover for 2015.

"That's why our Route 2015 plan stipulates that we want to achieve an average annual earnings growth rate of 15 percent," he said in the paper published on Wednesday. "That's considerably higher than the planned annual sales growth of 8 percent," he added.

"As a result of our programmes and opportunities we think we will grow faster than our competitors," Hainer told the paper.

Rival Nike, the world's largest athletic shoe and clothing maker, on Tuesday said it saw future orders (excluding currency exchange rates) -- a key measure of sales growth -- rising 11 percent year-on-year for December 2010 through April 2011, which was lower than many analysts' expectations.

Nike's Chief Financial Officer, Don Blair, said 2011 gross margins would be at least 50 basis points below 2010.

(Reporting by Michelle Martin)