Evolving an Industrial Digital Ecosystem: A Transformative Case of Leather Industry

Abstract

Advances in information technology have made delivering e-content easier to subject experts and to publish on the Web with minimal technical skills and assistance. The development of multimedia e-Learning content is no more labour-intensive process, requiring a team of Web designers and developers responsible for the technical development of these resources, thereby limiting its widespread adoption. Tools such as Adobe Captivate, Camtasia, Snap, Articulate, Lectora, etc., provide an easy way of developing e-contents. This exercise has triggered the idea of creating a knowledge system for an industry, namely leather industry. Digital libraries are large organized collection of digitized objects comprising of texts, images, graphs, data which in new technical terms are referred to as “Big Data”. Well-defined digital software has the potential to disseminate this information worldwide through Internet technologies. The emergence of World Wide Web makes the unprecedented volumes of data freely available to the entire society. This helps in building a domain-specific knowledge portal. The digital economy (also called the Internet economy, the new economy, or the Web economy) is an economy based on digital technologies, including communication networks (the Internet, Intranets, and Extranets), computers, software, and other related technologies. The digital infrastructures provide a global platform over which people and organizations interact, communicate, collaborate, and search for information. Creating new sources of revenue, rationalizing cost structures, enhancing the speed of technology adaptation are considered to be the three wheels of digital ecosystems. Knowledge management is about creating an environment where information can be readily shared. This information is not just the text information but also includes the data at the unit level generated out of research endeavours. Creating a learning organization culture is critical. The Web can now integrate learning and mission-critical business applications while delivering timely knowledge to each desktop. The end result is a knowledge management structure which includes an inventory of knowledge objects and a system in which these can be shared. This is an approach paper to illustrate the content development for a few aspects in leather industry, taking advantage of tools available and a portraying schematically the knowledge portal for this industry. The paper considers knowledge management system (KMS) and the IT tools for leather and allied industry and networking of academic institutes with industries to create knowledge hub and technology innovation centre using digital ecosystem eventually leading to digital transformation.