Wednesday, April 13, 2016

StitchWord Editorial Issue April 2016

I have been saying time and again for a long time now that the technology providers need to come forward to support small and medium manufacturers to make them more productive and efficient, just like they did for the garment exporters in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

There is no better platform to understand it better than at garment technology fairs happening around India. And true to expectations, the recently concluded GTE was visited mostly by the small manufacturers, not only from Delhi and around, but also from faraway places like Indore, Meerut, Varanasi, Jaipur, Kolkata and even from small centres in the south of India.

The fact remains that India has just 200 top garment manufacturing companies that account for around 70% of the exports from this country and only 20 domestic manufacturers worth mentioning in the domestic arena, and these elite companies are already in the radar of the technology providers, who service them well.

I am not saying that they should not lure the top-end companies; all that I am driving at is that these top-bracket companies don’t need to be at local fairs. They sponsor their trips to international fairs to show them their latest machines. This time around 120 companies have got sponsorship from their Japanese principals for JIAM.

The fairs in India are relevant for the smaller companies or job-workers who want to grow but fail because, for one, they do not have enough managerial skills to grow; and secondly, lack technical support. In both these cases, I think the technology suppliers can play a major role and ignite the second phase of development in the Indian garment manufacturing industry!

Another strong belief that I have is that today, digitisation, more than automation, is the need of the industry that has put basic technology in place… To justify automation, one needs to have the right volumes to get a decent ROI. I am sure the technology suppliers will have many more reasons to make you go for automation, but for me it is primarily about saving on labour and achieving certain quality, which with all due respect is also achievable by a good and trained operator. Of course, since the labour is quite cheap, letting go off a few of them will not make a substantial impact on the cost.

Now, digitisation of the organisation is altogether a different matter… It helps increase quick delivery, offers better price to the customer through better managed business, and helps achieve higher productivity and efficiency. Although everyone agrees that digitisation is important, but a mistake most companies that are getting into digitisation commit while imbibing the IT technology, is investing in creating a strong front-end which impresses all, but fails to deliver. What is required is an equally strong back-end interface to support the front-end.

All international companies have now allocated huge budgets to make the entire company go digital and these budgets are divided smartly over the entire chain from front-end to the back-end for optimal results… The right synchronisation of people and solutions is the answer to take the company towards a path of growth. You may get an order directly in your ERP system with a copy to all departments. But how well it is understood by the people responsible and how efficiently, regularly and diligently they pick up the required directions to execute the style, is entirely a different matter. The smooth and effective translation of communication and quick action on the same is what makes an organisation and defines the success of a digital initiative.

Achieving excellence in the manufacturing of a product is one thing, but ensuring that systems are in place to guarantee that the deliveries are on time and pre-production goes as per schedule, is another thing all together.

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