Thai Sock adopts Coats Digital's FastReactPlan to meet growing demand

FastReactPlan will enable the company to effectively synchronise its yarn and knitting capacity plans so it can accurately track sock production on the factory floor, assess and mitigate challenges quickly and improve decision making on the fly, so that it can capitalise on a growing market trend for smaller, more varied order assortments, Coats Digital said in a media release.

Founded in 1964, Thai Sock expanded rapidly from providing local yarn texture and yarn dyeing services to global sock production and has consistently invested in new technologies to become the largest vertically integrated sock manufacturer in Thailand. It is also one of the leading Asian sock suppliers to well-known global brands, including Nike, Paul Smith, Converse, M&S, Charles Tyrwhitt, Oakley and Bloch, among many others. As well as socks, the company also manufactures headbands, wristbands and textured nylon and polyester yarns. Thai Sock is renowned for producing fine luxury socks and has specialised knitting processes at its manufacturing facilities in Vietnam and China. The company also has large distribution centres in the UK and China.

Alisara Vichaiwatanapanich, deputy managing director, Thai Sock Co, said: “The main challenge we faced was with planning and visibility of capacity plans across our yarn and knitting teams. With multiple disconnected spreadsheets, which were time consuming to create and complex to compare and assess, we lacked an accurate tracking process to affectively confirm yarn lots against sock production which meant a significant disconnect between higher and lower levels of production. By removing our reliance on cumbersome Excel spreadsheets, FastReactPlan will enable us to greatly increase the speed and accuracy of production planning, tracking and order confirmation processes so that we can assess and resolve problems quickly, make informed decisions effectively from the start and ensure we can capitalise on greater demand for smaller, more complex orders. We anticipate that the FastReactPlan roll out will secure a 200 per cent return on investment quickly within the next year.”

Part of Coats Digital’s core Manufacturing Solution Suite, FastReactPlan is a dynamic, visual production planning and control tool that optimises delivery, efficiency, and lead times. Designed and developed specifically for footwear and apparel manufacturing factories, FastReactPlan helps companies integrate capacity, critical path, and materials into a single, integrated, dynamic planning system. The highly visual and flexible ‘drag and drop’ approach to planning allows effective master planning across multiple factories, as well as the detailed and accurate scheduling of manufacturing lines/machines, the release added.

Piyanit Meesang, sales manager Thailand, Coats Digital, said: "We are delighted to have partnered with Thai Sock to ensure it can establish robust best practice planning processes across the business. FastReactPlan will provide greater visibility and one version of the truth for all its capacity planning teams, so it can easily optimise efficiencies and eradicate problems quickly, and we look forward to helping it future proof its business effectively to ensure it retains its enviable status as one of the world’s leading sock producers.”

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (KD)