information technology infrastructure for textile and apparel industry ...

Focus THEMEDownloaded By: [Schmelich, Volker] At: 10:58 11 March 2010COMPETITIVE STRATEGY FORELECTRONICOMMERCEIn many respects, Korean economy hasbeen coordinated by the visible hand ofthe government. The world economy isbecoming a borderless one, which directlyaffects the Korean economy driving it intoan open economy. The rising cost of productionfactors, wage rates, interest rates,and land costs stalls economic growth.Both internal and external economic environmentcasts doubt over the prospectsof the Korean economy.Both public and private sectors are lookingfor ways to maintain their competitiveedge by improving economic efficiency,and one of those efforts is the useof IT. They are making an utmost effort tobuild the information-communication infrastructure,and promoting EC to explorenew business opportunities.Various efforts are being made to facilitatethe diffusion of the EC in Korea. Thediffusion of proprietary EC within a conglomeratemay be made quickly with littletrouble. The IOS or EC within a conglomerateis highly likely to be a closedone, which is not unusual among Koreanconglomerates. This may result in a situationthat goes against global technologicalfuture: an open EC system.Korean corporates have recently devoteda vast amount of effort to business processreengineering using IT to improve efficiency.In contrasts, SMEs lack appropriateIT skills requirrd for such innovativemovements. This may result in a wideninggap between SMEs and conglomeratesin their corporate efficiency. Sincecooperation among conglomerates andSMEs is very important to gain competitivenessin the global market, it is desiredthat conglomerates make up cooperativepartnership with SMEs and promote moreopen relationships. Both parties will benefitfrom strategically cooperative relationshipswhile specializing and repositioningthemselves in the network oforganizations via a smart adoption anduse of IT.INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY INFRASTRUCTUREFOR TEXTILE AND APPAREL INDUSTRY IN HONG KONGBV BENJAMIN P.-C. YEN AND C.I. SU. IEEM, HKUST, HONG KONG *Globalization of industries is a definingtrend of our time. The textile and apparelindustry, in particular, is one of the mostglobalized industries in today's world.Hong Kong's textile and apparel industryis a leader in managing the supply chainon a world-wide basis. To maintain itsprosperity and to deploy new computingand communication technology, we proposedan information technology (IT)infrastructure by which Hong Kong's textileand apparel industrialists can effectivelyand efficiently manage their globalbusiness. In order to succeed in thecompetitive global market, Hong Kongtextile and apparel companies need effectivecommunication among buyers, designers,merchandisers, suppliers and factories.With the increasing availability ofcomputing and communication informationnetworks, there is an imperative todeploy technologies such as the Internet,World Wide Webs, and clientlserver architecture,to serve the needs of industries.INTRODUCTIONThe textile and apparel industry stands outas one of the most globalized industriesin the world today. It differs from producer-drivensupply chains led by multinationalcompanies. The apparel industryis a buyer-driven commodity chain led bya coalition of retailers, contractors, subcontractors,merchandisers, buyers, andsuppliers. Each participating entity playsa role in a network of supply chains whichspan from fibers, to yarn, to fabrics, toaccessories, to garments, to trading andmarketing. Geographically, they spanmulti-continents and cut across regionaland national boundaries. With the shrinkingprofit margin and advent of moderncomputing communication networks, it isimperative that Hong Kong's textile andapparel industry seriously consider establishinga cost effective IT infrastructureto maintain their competitive edge.The functionality of the Information Technologybased systems can be classified intothree types:+ Information access - Information canbe retrieved and shared through theInternet, ED1 or other electronic systems.The information servers serve asinformation repository and distributioncenter, such as most of the homepageson the Internet.+ Information coordination - Informationcan be contributed and utilized withinmultiple organizations. The informationflow becomes two way communicationinstead of one way flow in the informationaccess. In information coordination,the information is updated andretrieved by multiple users for differentpurposes. Furthrrmore, the informationserver can coordinate the informationfor syncronization ormanagement, such as project managementand electronic markets.+ Information processing - In addition toinformation access and coordination,information processing is very usefulfor many applications. The informationservers need to process the informationor data from the clients and returnthe result. In this case, the serversfunction as application programs transparentto users.In this paper, we focus on the first twotypes of systems (information access andinformation coordination) mentionedabove. We first introduce the componentsand structure of generic information technologyinfrastructure. We then give examples,Hong Kong Clothing AccessoryInformation Network System (HKCAINS)and Hong Kong Textile and Apparel IndustryGlobal Applications (HKTAIGA) ontop of this infrastructure, dedicated fortextile and apparel industry in Hong Kong.The implementation issues of these twosystems are also addressed.

Focus THEMEOVERALL SYSTEM DESIGNThe overall system design is to achievethe application requirements while thecommunication infrastructure will adoptthe prevailing industry standards andprotocols supported by the Internet. Forexample, to handle the amount of graphicand image data required by apparel industries,various alternatives such as datacompression, mirror nodes, and dedicatedcommunication circuits will be evaluated.Issues such as security, journalizing, updateprocedures also need to be addressed.Flgure Ilnforrnatlon TechnologyInfrastructureService lnterfaceApplication Programming lnterface (API)Downloaded By: [Schmelich, Volker] At: 10:58 11 March 2010In addition, one of the goals of this infrastructureis to support a heterogeneousenvironment which consists of systemsdeveloped by four universities. A varietyof operating platforms might be supported,including Apple, IBM, Microsoft, variousUnix-type operating systems, and the proprietaryoperating systems often used onmainframes and minicomputers. It mightalso be desirable to support a variety ofdifferent communication mechanisms(message passing, remote procedure call(RPC), message queuing, etc.) and datatransport protocols (SNA, TCPIIP, NetWareIPX/SPX, etc.). The functions that the distributeddatabase software must performin a heterogeneous environment are ordersof magnitude more complex than thefunctions required in a homogeneous environment.To facilitate the creation of aheterogeneous distributed database environmentto support various applicationsdeveloped by several universities, we proposeto use a Standard Interface Model(SIM) which has been proved to be efficientand effective. The standard interfacemodel is designed to allow an applicationprogram written using a given databaseAPI to request the services of databasesoftware that support some other ApplicationProgramming Interface (API). In theproposed system, the server consists ofdatabase software, database API for variousapplications and communicationsserver software. The application runningon a client machine contains one or moredriver components designed to interfaceREFERENCESKalakota, R., Winston, A."Frontier of Electronic Commerce",Addison- Wesley, 1996."Company Logistics and global sourcing:a leap onto the information technology",Journal for Asia onTextile H Apparel, (8: I), Feb/Mar1997, pp. 16-22.Yen, B. P.-C. "Interactive SchedulingAgents on the Internet", in Proceedingsof Hawaii International Conferenceon System Science (HICSS), 1997.Su, C.J.,. Zhang, X. and Yen, B. P.-C."Internet Based Virtual ExhibitionSystems ", working paper, IEEM,Hong Kong University of Science andTechnology, 1997.Reconfigurable Scheduling Systems.HKCAINS technical report, IEEM,Hong Kong University of Science andTechnology, 1997.HKTAIGA technical report, IEEM,Hong Kong University of Science andTechnology, 1997.with a particular type of foreign application.The application in a client machineincludes a driver manager that implementstwo standard interfaces:+ Service Interface - which the API driversuse to interface with the drivermanager. The foreign database appli-cations need to write drivers that conformto the service interface to allowtheir database applications to interfacewith the driver manager.+ Standard Application ProgrammingInterface (SAPI) - which the API thatapplication programs use to request databaseservices.Database application developers that wishto participate in the proposed distributedenvironment must program to the standardAPI proposed in the system or use softwarethat converts a specific API to thestandard API (see Figure 1).SYSTEM MANAGEMENT POLICYFORMULATIONThe network is divided into four differenttypes of nodes, each with clear tasks orfunctions, and provides specific informationto other nodes. The four types of nodesare the central server, the application servers,the regional servers, and the hosts/users nodes (see Figure 2). The centralserver is in charge of network management,including user validation and authentication,network security, databaseupdating and accounting. The applicationservers support information sources whilethe regional servers, the user's access pointto the network, support information databaseslocally to speed up data retrievals.The company hostslend users play the roleof clients demanding information.There are four main tasks performed inthe system management module:

Focus THEME+ Registration is concerned with buildingup a logical view of the network.The task is needed for application servers,regional servers, and all hostslendusers.+ Database creationlupdating involvesinitialization and maintenance of distributeddatabases.+ User validation/authentication is theprimary task for system protection andsecurity.+ Accounting includes statistics measurement,performance evaluation and accountingmanagement.Figure 2.....Conceptua' Diagramof System Management~olicy FormulationDownloaded By: [Schmelich, Volker] At: 10:58 11 March 2010EXAMPLES: HKCAINS AND HKTAIGAHong Kong Clothing Accessory InformationNetwork System (HKCAINS) is a clientlserveroriented and local area networkbased database system with browsers forclothing accessory. Hong Kong Textile andApparel Industry Global Applications(HKTAIGA) system is a communicationinfrastructure for textile and apparel applications.HKCAINS serves as a browserfor HKTAIGA which is on top of the informationtechnology infrastructure. Thesystem was designed and developed at theIEEM department of HKUST. The primaryfunctions of HKTAIGA are informationaccess/sharing/distribution/coordinationbetween accessory suppliers and apparelmanufacturers. By using local databaseand incremental update technique, thesystem ensures the efficiency of search and* Chuan-Jun Su (cjsu@uxmail.ust.hk)is currently with the IndustrialEngineering Department at the HongKong University of Science and Technology.His interests include CAD/CAM,Solid Modeling, and AI applications indesign and manufacturing.Benjamin P.-C. Yen(pcyen@usthk.ust. hk) is assistantprofessor at the Hong Kong University ofScience and Technology. His researchinterests include Information Technology,Manufacturing Information Systems andInteractive Decision Support Systems.display. The many-to-many service linksand clientlserver architecture can furthermaintain the security level of the communication,including quotation and purchasingorder, between suppliers andmanufacturers. Figure 3 shows the clientinterface for manufacturers in HKTAIGA.RELATED ONGOING PROJECTS ANDFUTURE DIRECTIONSIn addition to the HKCAINS and HKTAIGAprojects mentioned above based on thisinformation technology infrastructure,there are many other related systems thatwere Or will be built on top of it, such asgarment acquisition systems, image searchengines, virtual exhibition systems, andscheduling systems (see Figure 4). Otherthan information access and informationFigure 3Client Interface for Manufacturers in HKTAlGAFigure 4Some of the related systems on top of the information technologyinfrastructure for textile and apparel industry Hong KongSystem Title Description Organization TypeInternet Garment garment acquisition CITA informationAcquisition Systems systems on the Internet accessMontage content-based image CSE, CUHK informationsearch enginesaccessVirtual Exhibition virtual reality based IEEM, HKUST informationSystems exhibition system coordinationInternet Scheduling Internet scheduling system IEEM, HKUST informationSystems for textile manufacturing processing

Focus THEMEDownloaded By: [Schmelich, Volker] At: 10:58 11 March 2010coordination, the systems on top of thiscan be information processing types ofinformation systems.The information technology infrastructuredoes not only favour textile and apparelindustry. The infrastructure is also adoptedby other industrial applications in HongKong, such as service industry, transportationlogistics, and CAD/CAPP/CAM.Most of these applications cover all of theinformation access, coordination andprocessing functions.The information technology infrastructureis highly cost effective for the executivemanagers, designers and merchandisers inthe textile and apparel industry. The informationtechnology infrastructure alsohelps to speed up their retrieval of worldwideindustry information. By always beingable to keep track of the most currentproduct trends world-wide, the users' competitiveadvantage will be increased. Thisprovides the necessary information infrastructureto put the Government IndustryProjects' applications to practical use. Withthe advent of the new technology, we cancontinuously improve the performance,such as real-time access and solid security,for this infrastructure.TOWARD THE CONSTRUCTION OFCUSTOMER ~NTERFACES FOR CYBER SHOPPING MALLS -HCI RESEARCH FOR ELECTRONIC COMMERCE~NTRODUC~IONNowadays, one of the most evidentchanges in the area of information technologyis the Internet. The rate of increasein the use of the Internet is second to nonecompared to any other technological advancesin the modern era (Chon, 1996).Twenty to thirty million people are estimatedto use the Internet currently, andthe number is expected to grow to twohundred million by the year 2000(Hoffman, Kalsbeek, and Novak, 1996). Asthe use of the lnternet becomes prevalent,it is expected to have a profound impacton our everyday life (Kraut, 1996).One important change that can be broughtby the Internet is manifested by electroniccommerce. Electronic commerce is definedas the execution of information-ladentransactions between two or more partiesusing inter-connected networks (Kalakotaand Whinston, 1997). It is a generic termto include all the commercial activitiesusing any kind of networks such as ED1or the Internet. Due to the rapid diffusionof the Internet, the market for electroniccommerce is also expected to increasesharply to 600 million dollars by the year2000 (IDC, 1997).Electronic commerce can be classified intothree distinct categories: inter-organizationalelectronic commerce, intra-organizationalelectronic commerce, and consumer-to-businesselectronic commerce(Kalakota and Whinston, 1996). Of thethree, consumer-to-business electroniccommerce, mostly implemented as cybershopping malls, has the greatest potentialto influence everyday life (Chung, 1996).Through cyber shopping malls, customerscan learn about products through electronicpublishing, buy products withelectronic cash, and even have informationgoods delivered over the network.Customers are spared the drudgery of trafficand long lines of conventional shopping.Suppliers can reduce overhead coststhrough less expensive distribution channels.For these reasons, the size of the cybermall market will grow to 660 million dollars,with twenty percent of total householdexpenses spent via the Internet (Boozand Hamilton, 1996).An important precondition to the successof cyber shopping malls is the constructionof appropriate customer interfaces.The customer interface is defined as theuser interfaces of cyber shopping mallsystems, through which customers interactto search for the target items and topurchase the identified items (Kim andMoon, 1997). The customer interface differsfrom the conventional user interfaceof software systems, because user interfacesmainly focus on the issues of conveyinginformation in an efficient waysuch as ease of use and ease of learning(Nielsen, 1993). Although conveying informationefficiently is also important inthe design of customer interfaces, the customerinterface should also provide apleasant shopping environment. It is notenough to simply provide a shopping mallthat is easy to use or easy to learn. Thecyber mall should satisfy or "impress" thecustomers so as to make their shoppingexperience a pleasurable one, so much thatcustomers are tempted to return. Otherwise,customers would not visit the shoppingmall again or would easily switch toan alternative mall, because the switchingcost is extremely low in cyber space.Competitors are just a "click" away fromthe current mall in the cyber space.In spite of the importance of customerinterfaces in electronic commerce systems,most prior studies focus on the technologicalissues related to their implemen-