Fashion Technology a Billion Dollar Opportunity- AI: Innovation, Insights & Investment Strategies

my name is Jessica carch I'm a fashion and Technology expert and I go to conferences to do research so that you don't have to Fashion technology is going to change fashion forever and not

only do you need to know exactly what it is and what it does but you do need to know how it will affect you depending on what you do now you may be wondering

what makes me the expert and I'm glad you ask outside of being a leading recognized and subject matter expert I am someone that has studied fashion

technology since around 2013 and I have a masters from Cornell specifically around how digital Innovation can affect conversion so how people shop what they're looking to buy

and what is going to influence them and what I found in my research is that technology will absolutely streamline some of the processes that we have now in the fashion industry that are Antiquated however it may not always be

what you think I've spent my time researching testing learning repeating I've spent time as a product manager but I started my career right there on the

retail floor giving 10,000 hours in fitting rooms listening to exactly what drives customers to actually buy a product owned a store and I learned

about what actually drives people to purchase online I learned a lot about peer-to-peer influence and how that works and then finally I study technology as a product manager and what

really helps people to adopt technology and like it that is kind of what makes me an expert but if that doesn't convince you I would invite you to read some of my articles that are published

in the business of fashion women's we daily the sourcing journal and soon vog business so let's get into it why is fashion technology important well I'm so

glad you asked if you haven't noticed technology is rapidly innovating every single industry very quickly and while it can be confusing as to how it will affect fashion I can make it easy for

you fashion has a ton of inefficiencies now if you've worked in a design room you know what I'm talking about if you worked in supply chain in general you know what I'm talking about and if

you've ever worked in a retail store or in e-commerce then you know exactly what I'm talking about well technology is here to Simply help solve some of the biggest problems in fashion now what

types of Technology can do that all types it absolutely depends on where in the supply chain we are and what the problem is now a lot of times people ask

do I have to be a huge company to invest in technology absolutely not it doesn't matter the size of the company what matters is that you can properly identify your gaps your inefficiencies

and work streams that need to be improved once you do that and have a really good feel for your organization how your organization implements new tools who's in charge of what you can

begin to work backwards to figure out what is the exact problem you're trying to solve this is important because a lot of people get excited about a technology they hear something new and they're like oh my God we can implement this I have

all of these ideas that's not the way to go technology is great for the entertainment purposes and for gaming and for having a good time but when it comes to Fashion the purpose of technology is really to match people to

product and to drive conversions of course there's an entertainment component to it and if that helps to drive convergence I'm absolutely all for that if those components aren't

necessarily going to be the things that helps to reduce your dead inventory reduce returns and create happier customers and you probably want to go in another Direction with what technology

you want to implement people also like to ask what's the most important technology well it's hard to say because again it depends on the problem that we are solving but I would say right now the technology that's going to have the

biggest influence on the industry is absolutely ai ai is changing everything in the fashion industry and I do believe it is going to be important for Brands

to rapidly accept this change understand exactly what it is and pick the best AI tools for your organization so there's generative AI tools like raspberry AI now this was specifically designed with

the workflow of designers in mind so it helps designers to both ideate and create new products that people actually want to buy according to their CEO now I spoke with their CEO Cheryl and she

mentioned that some of the problems that she saw outside of the Antiquated workst streams that are are in the design process with not utilizing the right data to implement into the creation

process and produce things that people are absolutely going to buy this is a big deal and we'll talk about this later because when people don't buy products we get a lot of dead stock and dead stock is a huge huge problem for a lot

of Brands and retailers you may be thinking like well will this replace the job of a designer like how can designers use generative Ai and not feel like they're going to get replaced or that their creativity isn't appreciated

creative is appreciated obviously and there's so much clothing waste and dumps right now to show you just how much creativity should outweigh actual data in the design process but we won't get

into that this is not a tool that's going to replace designers this is simply a tool to help the designer's workflows to be a little bit more productive you want more information about raspberry AI I say check them out

they'll give you a demo they're really awesome and they just received a huge round of investment so if you didn't believe that gen is going to change f I would say follow the money next in gen

we have companies like dius Le what dieus Le is doing is very interesting slightly controversial but it's important to know they're cutting the cost of Photography production by 50%

now how are they doing this their technology helps to generate models and you may be wondering hm what do those models look like but we're not talking about silly goofy avatars we're talking

about real lifelike human looking Avatar instead of The Uncanny Valley issue where things look a little creepy and you can't really use them and nobody cares the reason why this is super

important is the demand that social commerce has created which is people buying products through social media means that there has to be more and more photo shoots every day content is kinging everyone's doing content you

always need a new look a new person a new style this can certainly become a financial burden for a lot of Brands and retailers who are trying to keep up with the demand of content companies like diffusely makes this easy because they

generate new avatars that actually match is your customer demographic you may remember when companies first started generating digital models it got a little weird but some of those digital models look more like gaming models this

is not that and then some of those digital models people kind of gave some feedback and said is this cutting into diversity equity and inclusion and the answer is no what this is doing is

helping to create more diversity because you are able to generate models that look very similar to your actual demographic plus if you have fit models that you know have a certain body type

but maybe they're not comfortable being models or maybe you want to change their look this is a great tool to both answer the fit question and the parity question between peer-to-peer engagement now a

stat that you should keep in mind before you dismiss this is that when people see a product and someone who looks like them they are four times more likely to buy so if you're looking for ways to get your customers excited about your

product and to help them feel like they're being reflected in your marketing absolutely consider diffusing now this is just the tip of the iceberg of what AI is doing and while I won't go

into a ton of details there's so many other ways to use AI gen AI specifically in fashion to make sure that you are cutting cost and you're being productive

and you are streamlining your workflows which is so important some of the biggest challenges in fashion technology currently is just product adoption fashion is really monkey see monkey D friends want to know that something

worked with someone else before they use it because in the past technology did exist and made a ton of promises and then of course they underd delivered but we are in a new era you see the beauty

of having AI is that tools no longer have to have a long adoption period that requires you to be so super proficient you're spending eight to 12 weeks learning it just to get confused when

you start it up and now you're not confident enough to use it in the way that it should be used AI based tools are super easy to use so that learning Gap that exists with other Technologies

really doesn't exist with AI plus if you're using chat GPT you see how simple it is to ask questions and get answers immediately this is a beautiful beautiful thing because some time ago I

hosted a round table at Pi apparel some of the feedback that I got from people in their companies who had certain Technologies but they hadn't used it people were very intimidated by technology they're not sure how it works

they're not sure how it will benefit them and so they didn't use it second issue was the time that it takes to learn a new technology a lot of people in organizations were intimidated by that amount of time and to be honest

they told me in competence that no one wanted to train on the weekends and not get paid to learn a tool that could possibly replace their job one day obviously there's so many gaps in this way of thinking but this is how people

feel and so we have to pay attention to it this is the most important part of integrating technology and why you have to know what problem you're solving the sentiments around your personnel is what people fear they're not going to utilize

properly have no fear newer tools especially AI based tools are making this super simple so that no one has to be left behind in the tech Revolution now no technology is going to be perfect

technology fills all the time you really have to have patience when it comes to implementing the right technological tools you are going to test learn and repeat so having a strategy to do that within your organization is super

important so that no one gets upset when things aren't working in the way that they should all of these things are new these new workflows take time to adopt and you have to have a cushion in order

to deal with problems that could arise so know that these are not perfect tools they never claim to be but they absolutely are the future of this industry investors who maybe have been

turned off in the past of putting their money into fashion tech for various reasons that are all respectable now is the time to start considering which

technology is best to invest in it's no longer a question of if you're going to get a return but it's more of a question of when you're going to get a return as

I mentioned AI is streamlining so many processes and tools to make things easier that there are a ton of companies that need investment are super scalable

it helps to create new workflows that solve billion dooll problems in this trillion doll industry there are Frameworks of choosing the right tool

that I would suggest I would love for investors to reconsider the fashion Tech space in fact Andre and horist did and they made their investment into raspberry AI I think this is a big ation

that investment into this space is going to continue and hooking up with the right company solving the right problem will be super imperative in the future as a fashion technology expert again I

understand both the technological side the implementation side building right tools solving problems but I also understand the fashion industry very well that gives me a very great perspective on understanding the past

issues with fashion technology why things don't work why things failed and also where we can go in the future in order to avoid those same mistakes Brands and retailers should be very

optimistic about what's going to happen and if you're not optimistic then perhaps watch other people Implement these tools and make more money and then jump on the bandwagon either way fashion technology is going to change our

industry forever I also think this is a great time for educators help your students be prepared for a changing industry and for school systems to really get on board with rethinking your

curriculum I've taught at fit NC State do Corell I've taught at several universities as a guest lecturer no matter where I am teaching students come up to me all the time and say oh my God

we're not learning this this is what I've been wanting to learn so Step It Up universities definitely update these outdated curriculums understand how the industry is changing and prepare our future Workforce so that they are not

disappointed there will be tons of opportunities to connect with me in the future I'm actually building a fashion technology oneon-one curriculum I want you to stay in touch with me in the future if you're interested in fashion

technology I'm building a fashion technology curriculum as well as putting together some really cool activations and really cool conference type thing so

that people can learn exactly what is needed for this space in a way that is fun playful but also straight to the point if you haven't signed up for my newsletter on LinkedIn make sure to do

so follow me on the platforms and stay tuned because I'm telling you fashion Tech is going to take off this year in way like never before and you do not want to miss so