Commercially-available software solutions and new automation tools are enabling major gains for savvy textile and garment manufacturers across the ASEAN and South Asia regions.From day one, they are enabling the integration of many tasks that were previously carried out laboriously – often using standard calculators and office spreadsheets, or just as often relying on the eyes and mental calculations of skilled operators – to pay dividends.

Yarn savings

In spinning mills, for example, raw materials typically account for 65 to 75% of production costs for cotton yarn and saving just 1% of waste here can be significant. The optimum sourcing and use of raw materials needs to take into account inventory levels, the required yarn quality and the cotton’s parameters.

Switzerland’s Uster has a powerful software designed to greatly simplify these calculations. The software analyses fibre data from available inventories and creates consistent and reliable laydowns for optimum quality and performance. A cost reduction of US$255,000 per year can be typically achieved in a mill with 50,000 spindles, based on Ne 30 yarn at a price of US$1.8 per kg of cotton.

Fabric inspection

Many fabric manufacturers meanwhile still rely on human inspection for final checks of fabric quality, but the latest camera-based vision systems can eliminate defects much more accurately and instantly achieve significant savings. First quality every time drastically reduces returns which are currently extremely costly to both an individual company and the environment.

“At best studies show that manual inspection can detect around 65% of faults present in the fabric, while the latest automated systems, such as our WebSpector, are achieving defect detection of over 98%,” says Mark Shelton, CEO and Managing Director of UK-based Shelton Vision.

“Not only this, using machine learning, our system automatically trains new styles and our AI platform is continuously updating to achieve high accuracy of real time defect naming and grading to eliminate false positives and provide consistently accurate data for both roll cutting optimisation and yield increase.”

Pattern and sample making

Designing and creating garment patterns – as the starting point for the entire garment making process, has in the past required skilled designers who are not only highly creative – but also adept at handling often complex CAD tools.

Garment design, however, is also now undergoing a transformation, with traditional methods being significantly replaced by digital tools, AI and 3D modelling, which offer greater simplicity, efficiency and precision.

3D pattern-making software platforms supplied by ITMA ASIA + CITME Singapore exhibitors such as KM.ON, the automation arm of German knitting technology leader Karl Mayer, and Japan’s Shima Seiki are accelerating digital fabric sourcing prior to 3D design and production and also eliminating previously time-consuming and costly fabric sampling.

Such systems enable fabric data, including texture maps, to be created without fabric samples, and colourways and patterns to be freely edited, in combination with the creation of all information for automatic production.

Colour consistency

Another UK company, Verivide, specialises in colour matching systems which can also speed up quality control, sustain product integrity and reduce waste.

“In traditional fabric sampling, colour discrepancies between fabric batches can lead to costly mistakes and delays and automated colour matching systems generally use spectrophotometers to ensure that colours are consistent across fabric samples and production runs,” says the company’s sales manager Adam Dakin.

“Spectrophotometers, however, have certain limitations which our DigiEye system overcomes by combining lighting and visual assessment principles with non-contact digital measurement for quantifiable and objective quality control. It collects and processes data that can be communicated and shared instantly.”

Lifecycle management

Sophisticated software solutions also include those for lifecycle management that streamline and integrate the key pre-production processes required for garments to be fully approved and production ready.

Others enable faster, more reliable order confirmation process and production plans which are optimised for delivery, speed and efficiency, or integrate fabric buying and cutting operations into a single platform.

Across Asia, many integrated mills are now realising that relying on a combination of Excel spreadsheets, telephone conversation notes and emails across multiple departments has had its day. Digitally-controlled production is the way forward for realising reductions in lead times, improvements in on-time delivery and increasing productivity across the board.

ITMA ASIA + CITME, Singapore is set to provide the latest software solutions to help textile and garment manufacturers increase their production efficiency.