Introduction

Many Apparel manufacturers are suffering lot due to the competitive market that minimizes the Profitability. Everyone think of revolutionary method for minimizing the production cost. In the existing production system the cutting and sewing process is mostly labour oriented. The sewing process may create needle hole on the sewn product that reduce the marketability and also the stress created at the seam portion will also leads to premature failure¹ in the garment. Finally the cutting and sewing is a labour intensive process which creates the human error, and then the cutting process creates more fabric wastages.

Seamless garment technology is advancement in apparel industry which eliminates the fabric laying, cutting and sewing process. Ultimately we can minimize the production cost by 40% compared² from the existing apparel production system as well as production time. In addition to that seamless garment gives more comfort because of having no seam in its structure, even though sleeve and neckline of the garment could be joined through sewing. Circular knitting machines were used for making seamless garment in earlier days. During 80's V bed flat bed knitting machine were used for seamless under wear manufacturing. The leading knitting machine manufacturers for making seamless garments are SANTONI, SANGIACOMO etc...

The Growth rate of Seamless garment is described from the below table

Year	Growth rate
1998	2%
2001	9%
2003	18%
2007	35%

(Source Santoni report)

In the year of 1998 seamless garment contributes 2% of global underwear garment production, within 3 years it reached up to 9% likewise 2003 it was 18% improvement, 2007 it was 35%. In future growth rate is expected to increase very high. Earlier Seamless garment manufacturing was limited to underwear. But now lots of fashion wear are being developed with this technology. This Technology not only reduce the post labour work after fabric forming but also gives comfort and perfect fit to the wearer.

Advantages of Seamless garments:

New technology has their unique advantages both commercial as well as economical, this seamless technology also not exception .The following advantages we can find from seamless technology.

1. Freedom of body movement: Generally the seam portion of any garment is not having the same elasticity as compared to the body fabric, so the difference in elasticity will affect the free body movement. Since the seamless garment doesnt have any seam in it structure this problem has been eliminated.
   
   
2. Wider range of fit for different range of body shapes: In a single garment measurement can suitable for wider range of fit for different range of body shapes because of its higher elasticity
   
   
3. Inherent softness: There are no bulky and annoying stitches at the underarm points, shoulders and neck lines, which may cause irritation to the wearer, since the garment having seam free structure it provides the soft feel only.
   
   
4. It reduces labour cost: Due to the elimination cutting and sewing process it is obvious to reduce more labour involvement.