Nike Hopes To Use More Automation Elements In The Production Of Sports Shoes.

As a professional marathon runner, Knox Robinson should wear dozens of pairs a year.

。

But in competition, he has only one choice, that is Nike's Flyknit Racer.

For many athletes, this is special.

It can provide a seamless and comfortable experience, which is not characteristic of other brands.

Since the first appearance of Nike Flyknit Racer in 2012, it has been seen as a technological breakthrough.

It passes through a special kind.

Production requires less labor and less material than most other sports shoes.

Now, this technology has become the basis for the test of producing more radical manufacturing technology, and may even subvert the whole sports and leisure clothing industry, and become a means to speed up the trend of globalization.

According to the world clothing and shoe net, since 2015, Nike has started working with Flex, a high-tech company's OEM factory for Fitbit and Lenovo, hoping to use more automation elements in the production of sports shoes as labor-intensive products.

The Flex factory in Mexico has become one of Nike's most important factories in the world. It is responsible for not only product production, but also a series of innovations for Nike, such as laser cutting and automatic bonding technology.

For Nike, deeper automation means two great attractions, which further reduce costs and increase profitability.

At the same time, it can make the company respond more flexibly and quickly to fashion design changes, and provide new design styles faster.

For example, Roshe sports shoes without Flyknit technology are priced at $75, while the price of sneakers using Flyknit technology can be increased to $130.

"Now we are modernizing the footwear industry. This is a long-term, multi billion dollar plan, not just the result of a few years or even decades."

Chris Collier, chief financial officer of Nike, said.

Through cooperation with Flex, it will also bring wider impact.

Over the past 20 years, Nike has been one of the representative companies that outsource production tasks to developing countries' factories, but it has also been accused of child labour or abuse of labour.

But now many of these developing countries are beginning to worry that robotics will deprive themselves of their jobs.

If Nike striving to achieve greater automation, it will plunge itself into another whirlpool of controversy.

Nike said that increasing sales could allow more automation technology to keep its existing workforce.

At present, Nike is one of the largest multinational companies in the world. Footwear products have been employed by over 493 thousand workers in 15 countries.

In the production process of Nike's products, it has covered more than 1 million 20 thousand workers in 42 countries.

Sridhar Tayur, Professor of operations management at Tepper business school, Carnegie Mellon University, said Nike's use of automation technology will determine the development of the industry as a whole.

"Unless Africa or other places are chosen, labour costs in Asia are no longer as low as they used to be.

For a long time, Nike will be under great pressure to shift factories to lower labor costs or choose more automation elements. "

He said.

In the 2017 fiscal year, Nike's sales volume was $34 billion 400 million, and Nike still needs to continue its efforts to achieve its target of 50 billion sales in 2020.

This is the goal set by the CEO Mark Parker in 2015. Although the company's business is growing, it still faces fierce competition from Adidas, Germany.

For deeper automation, Nike has enormous potential advantages.

Citibank analyst Jim Suva and Kate McShane said that the production of Air Max sports shoes through the Flex factory can reduce labor costs by 50% and material costs by 20%, which is equivalent to an increase of 12.5% gross margin and a direct increase to 55.5%.

If further estimates, if the output of the Flex plant can bear 30% of the sales in North America, then Nike will save $400 million of labor and raw material costs per year, equivalent to an increase of 5% in earnings per share.

"We think the whole garment industry is paying close attention to this problem. If Nike succeeds, more companies will begin to pform."

Suva says.

More automation technology can not only reduce costs, but also be able to keep pace with market changes more flexibly.

In the clothing industry, successful people are often those who can continuously launch new products, and can quickly meet the tastes and shopping habits of consumers.

However, some enterprises are often unable to take actions when adapting to the so-called fast changing trend of fashion. The main reason is that the manufacturing process is too complex to cause slow response.

Through the traditional technology to create a pair of sports shoes, it needs 10 dimensions and a total of more than 200 components, and it also needs to be manually fitted and glued.

The Flex factory's new manufacturing process has achieved two processes: automatic bonding and laser cutting.

It takes months to complete the design, development and manufacture of a pair of sneakers.

With the help of the Flex factory, it will take only 3 to 4 weeks to complete the process of making a pair of trainers.

According to ILO statistics, in the countries of Kampuchea, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, 56% of the employment opportunities will be replaced by automation in 10 or 20 years, among which clothing and footwear manufacturing industry is the most seriously affected.

But Nike said that if sales continue to grow, the supply chain workers will not lose their jobs, but they will not stop making more automation in product manufacturing.

"We will not shy away from the impact of this change on the labour market. We need more manufacturing jobs on the basis of existing resources."

Eric Sprunk, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Nike, said.

More interesting reports, please pay attention to the world clothing shoes and hats net.