It will not be a surprise that the events in 2020 started a period of rapid change and transition for the fashion industry. At its.fashion, we’ve seen many or our client businesses make the leap to Cloud PLM and online based product management systems.
Good Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems help businesses and their external partners develop and create new products with more control and visibility. It enables them to precisely manage the process from beginning to end, ensuring all developments are delivered on time and to budget.
At its.fashion, we’ve certainly noticed the difference between businesses which did, and did not invest in better technology tools, such as the WFX Cloud PLM suite. This is evidenced with the wide range of new clients from all corners of the fashion industry. With the increasing popularity (and necessity) of Cloud PLM, this included great, progressive brands and retailers like Wiggle, Belstaff, Margaret Howell, Curvy Kate, DCK, TOAST and Cefinn by Samantha Cameron.
In addition, we saw existing clients expand on their use of their systems to create further bridges across more departments than before, implementing new processes to deal with the changing business needs as they did.
We asked a selection of businesses why they decided to sign up to, or expand their Cloud PLM:
How Fashion Businesses benefit from Cloud based Product Lifecycle Management Systems.
1. It’s available wherever you are
Working from home has had a monumental impact on the way we work, and we have all had to change how we collaborate with not only our colleagues, but also our vendors and other business contacts.
As the PLM system is in the cloud, you and your suppliers can access it from anywhere, whether you are in the office or on your laptop at home.
2. Instant and simultaneous results mean the whole team can get involved
Before switching to PLM, many of our customers relied on spreadsheets and emails. This can make it easy to miss out on vital information or get locked out of (the wrong version of) a spreadsheet if someone is in it.
With Cloud PLM, you can involve as many people as you need in your crucial processes. Best of all, the system updates automatically, meaning the entire team will always see the most up to date content on their screens.
3. Everything is in one place
When your team is apart, it’s crucial to have all your documentation and product data is in one place for easy access. With Cloud PLM, all your useful templates and files are together in one process driven system for convenience, control and ease of use.
Many of our customers comment that they save hours using PLM as they don’t have to search their computers and inboxes for specific documents or information that was sent to them before. Just imagine how you can invest that extra time back into your business!
4. You can stay safe, secure and compliant
The rise of cybercrime and the introduction of regulations like GDPR means data needs to be protected at all times.
All our Cloud PLM data is protected with banking level security, regularly backed up and has multiple fallback servers for almost instant restore in the case of a disaster anywhere in the world. By using this high level infrastructure, you can set different access levels for groups of team members, giving your business data a more secure future and your customers’ peace of mind.
5. The system grows with your team
With the growth of online shopping, many fashion companies actually saw a welcome boost in sales in 2020. We have seen many of our clients expand their teams during this tumultuous year.
Cloud PLM scales with your team, meaning that as your company grows, PLM can accommodate any changes. Whether it is more users or expansion modules, you just keep growing and it will seamlessly grow with you.
Another great bonus is that we upgrade PLM several times a year, meaning you will always have the latest version to work with.
Should the jump into Cloud Fashion PLM be part of your New Year’s resolution for 2022?
If you are looking to supercharge your business and streamline your manufacturing processes next year, Cloud PLM may be an excellent option for your business.
Here at its.fashion, we have experience of implementing PLM systems across fashion brands all over the world, creating perfectly customized solutions which do more than just manage your development process. Planning, purchasing and quality control also feed into the process and your final product data can be exported or integrated with your other systems. Enter something only once, then use it everywhere.
So, in conclusion: This year has been exceptional in some ways, as it highlighted just how manual their processes are to many fashion businesses. The resulting rush to implement Cloud based PLM systems like WFX (the leader in Cloud based PLM for the fashion industry) was actually a logical consequence.
Can you see your company progressing the way collections are created and managed, creating product visibility and seamless collaborative processes in the cloud?
Topic: How Fashion Businesses benefit from Cloud based specialist fashion PLM Systems
