The role of artificial intelligence in shaping the future of Agile fashion industry

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become an integral part of every industry. With the emergence of big data, the industries, and more especially textile and apparel (T&A) industry, are on the brink of relationships with consumers, suppliers, and competitors. They need to handle different scenarios with a multitude of complex correlations and dependencies between them and uncertainties arising from human interaction. It has become imperative for them to manage huge amounts of data for the optimization of decision-making processes. In such circumstances, AI techniques have shown promise in every segment of the T&A value chain, from product discovery to robotic manufacturing. The potential wide-ranging applications of AI in T&A industry have found their ways into design support systems to T&A recommendation systems, intelligent tracking systems, quality control, T&A forecasting, predictive analytics in supply chain management or social networks and T&A e-commerce. The research recourses to the qualitative method in the form of systematic literature review and in-depth interviews from senior management people and industry experts. Findings identify the dimensions of AI to develop dynamic capability along with its potential impact and probable challenges. As such, the findings contribute to relevant literature and offer useful insights for academia and practitioners.

Keywords:

• Artificial intelligence
• dynamic capability
• big data analytics
• apparel
• textile and fashion industry
• Agile manufacturing

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mujahid Mohiuddin Babu

Mujahid Mohiuddin Babu works as an Assistant Professor in Marketing in Coventry University, UK. His research interest lies in the areas of firm’s strategic adoption of Technology and its impact. His research works have been presented and published in various leading Journals and conferences of business and marketing such as Industrial Marketing Management, Journal of Business Research, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Journal of Marketing Management, Information Systems Frontiers, Annals of Operation Research, Production Planning and Control, EMAC, Academy of Marketing, AMA and Academy of Marketing Science (AMS).

Shahriar Akter

Shahriar Akter is an Associate Professor of Analytics & Innovation at the School of Business at UOW. He was awarded his PhD from UNSW Business School Australia, with a doctoral fellowship from the University of Oxford. He was recognised as the Top Australian Business Researcher by the Australian Newspaper's Research Magazine in 2021. He was also featured as one of the leading academic data leaders in the world by the CDO magazine in 2022. He has published in leading business & management journals with 100+ publications. His current h-Index is 36 with more than 9000 citations. His research interests are AI and big data analytics.

Mahfuzur Rahman

Mahfuzur Rahman is an associate Professor at the University of Lincoln, UK. His current academic and research interests are in the area of sustainability and innovation with a focus on emerging markets. Dr Rahman is also an Academic Adviser to the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission, UK. He is an active team member of the University of Lincoln UNESCO Chair on Responsible Foresight for Sustainable Development.

Md Morsaline Billah

Md Morsaline Billah is an enthusiastic and proactive biotechnologist with extensive experience in teaching and research at undergraduate and graduate level students and proficient in theoretical and experimental research activities in allied fields of interest with good expertise on bioprospecting of plant and microbial resources, bio nanotechnology, biotechnology business, curriculum design and development having strong interest in educating students and sharing knowledge to broader audience in research and academia.

Dieu Hack-Polay

Dieu Hack-Polay is an Associate Professor at Lincoln International Business School, University of Lincoln, UK. He specializes in Organizational Behaviour & Management in the Lincoln International Business School. He worked for several years in various sectors of activity including the voluntary sector and local government as a human resources and training practitioner in the United Kingdom.