Machine manufacture?

[arnoldus]

Hi, as I stated in my introduction thread I'm a business student and I've had a couple of years of engineering as well before I changed major. I've been reading up on some threads about kilt pricing and it has aroused my interest.

I've seen the threads detailing the several costs of manufacture. I was surprised to see that even cheap kilts are handsewn. But I fail to understand why it's a manual job? The mills don't weave fabric manually, so why should the kilts be made that way? I haven't bought Art of Kiltmaking yet, and I don't know much about the clothes manufacture in general but I think I understand the discrete operations involved.
I've learned in some threads that a good fit and good pleats are all about math. Shouldn't it be possible to generate a made-to-measure pattern from a computer when getting peoples 3 measurements? Could that not be fed into an automatic sewing machine?

I must admit that I don't know much about clothesmaking, but I would be surprised if there aren't any (semi-)automatic ways of doing it, at least the simpler, casual versions in PV? Perhaps not entirely but even a couple of hours saved add up quickly. What info is there on this?