Clothing collides with AI, Meitu, Cloud Quick Reverse, and SHEIN "Wait for the Future"

Illustration courtesy of Canva

AI and clothing, these two seemingly unrelated fields have rubbed different sparks.

In the past few years, the national tide has driven the prosperity of many "new Chinese" clothing such as Hanfu, horse-faced skirts, cheongsam, etc., some merchants have taken this opportunity to make a lot of money, and some merchants are struggling to catch up with the trend.

Taking the horse face skirt as an example, thanks to the rise of the "new Chinese" trend, the sales of the horse face skirt continue to rise, and the market scale continues to expand. According to Mojing Insight statistics, from March 2023 to February 2024, the online market size of horse face skirts will reach 2.35 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 503.1%.

On the tuyere, many clothing companies with a keen sense of smell have begun to cut into the horse face skirt track. In Cao County alone, there are about 1,500 horse face skirt enterprises, with 60,000 employees, and the proportion of the horse face skirt industry is more than sixty percent, but the vast majority of wind chasers outside Cao County have not been able to do so, mainly because of the mismatch in production capacity.

In order to improve the overall supply efficiency of clothing, clothing suppliers have started the idea of AI, and intelligence and digitalization have become the keywords for the development of the clothing industry.

Under the "fast" demand, the supply of clothing is weak

Influenced by social media, a new generation of young consumers has shown a high interest and demand for all kinds of popular products, such as popular shoes, bags, outerwear, etc. Consumers want to be able to keep up with the latest fashion trends and show their fashion taste, so they have higher requirements for the speed of new products.

In order to meet the "fast fashion" demand of young people, apparel suppliers need to shorten the time to design, production and time-to-market, and speed up the supply of apparel products. This means that clothing suppliers need to establish an efficient supply chain system, but the traditional clothing supply chain is cumbersome and complex, and how to speed up the efficiency of the supply chain is a difficult problem.

First, the traditional supply chain has a long cycle and it is difficult to flexibly adjust production and supply plans, and it is unable to respond quickly to market changes. Second, the traditional clothing supply chain involves multiple subjects, and the efficiency of coordination and management is low and difficult. Third, the inventory cost pressure of the traditional clothing supply chain is high, and it is difficult to cope with rapid changes and adapt to the needs of small batch production.

The traditional garment supply industry has long cycles, high costs, and difficult management, making it difficult to adapt to the production and supply needs of "fast fashion". Under this trend, apparel suppliers are actively improving and innovating the apparel supply chain, and accelerating the digitalization of the supply chain has become an industry consensus.

Design: AI to improve efficiency

In terms of market recognition, AI design is not a new thing. As early as the era of the rise of AI, many companies have used AI as a tool to assist design, and clothing AI design tools have sprung up.

According to incomplete statistics, the start-up Moyu AI has launched the clothing AI design tool Moyu GPT, the AI clothing design company CHIMER AI (Chimera Intelligence) has launched an AI design platform, the Shanghai local start-up Tufei AI has released the Tufei AI mapping software, and Zhijing Technology has independently developed and created Fashion 3D software to achieve high-fidelity 3D digital sample modeling through digital technology.

Apparel AI design platforms, software, and tools are blooming, and the role of AI in the field of apparel design is becoming more and more prominent, and the value of commercialization is constantly improving.

For designers, clothing AI design products integrate the capabilities of AIGC large models, which can provide inspiration and creativity, accelerate the design process, optimize clothing size and cut, help designers improve design efficiency and product quality, and efficiently produce popular models that meet market demand.

Taking Fashion 3D as an example, Fashion 3D provides a massive style library, a version library, a parameter library, a diversified material, a digital sample, and a 3D online pattern-making. At present, 10,000+ designers, pattern makers, and garment factories use Fashion 3D.

For apparel suppliers, the introduction of apparel AI design tools can improve design efficiency and innovation capabilities, reduce costs and risks, improve design quality and compliance, and enhance market competitiveness.

You must know that the clothing supply industry is a very involuted field, and the design efficiency is one step faster than others, the production efficiency can be improved, and the suppliers can better grasp the market trends and needs, which is also the reason why clothing suppliers and clothing brands are actively deploying the AI clothing field.

Recently, the apparel supply chain company "Cloud Fast Reversal" completed tens of millions of yuan in Pre-A+ round of financing led by Tianze Taurus Capital, and it is planned that the funds will be used to purchase equipment, expand digital printing production capacity and increase the development of AI application products. Prior to this, the company applied AIGC to the design and plate making process, and could complete the entire design development, production, and fabric delivery process within 48 hours.

In the era of AI, it has become the norm in the market to use AIGC tools to assist or automatically generate clothing designs. Perhaps in the near future, with the development of AI technology, there may be a completely AI-based clothing design process in the field of clothing design, and instructing AI to work and make money will also become a reality.

Manufacturing: AI expands production

AI is not only widely used in clothing design and creativity, but also in the garment manufacturing side to contribute to improving production efficiency.

As mentioned above, the condition for meeting the demand for "fast fashion" is to capture the trend and establish a product production line in a short period of time. This also requires garment manufacturing factories to be able to gain timely insight into consumer needs, produce on demand, and deliver flexibly, while traditional garment manufacturing factories obviously do not have the corresponding production capacity.

At a time when traditional garment manufacturing factories are suffering from industry pain points such as long cycles, high costs, and inflexibility, the flexible supply chain system built by SHEIN, a fast fashion e-commerce company, can be said to be a positive guide for the garment manufacturing industry.

It is understood that in the first half of 2023, SHEIN announced that it would invest 500 million yuan in 5 years to continue to deepen the supplier empowerment work, and established the first clothing manufacturing innovation center (called the "smart brain" by SHEIN insiders) to continue to output flexible supply chain standards. By the end of 2023, SHEIN has helped more than 130 cooperative supplier factories upgrade their 430,000 square meters of factory buildings.

Compared with the traditional garment manufacturing supply chain, SHEIN's flexible supply chain has two key capabilities: the production mode of small orders and quick returns, and digital management tools.

On the one hand, SHEIN adopts a small-order production model, which can quickly produce and rework according to actual demand to avoid the risk of overstocking and unsalable. Compared with the traditional supply chain, SHEIN does not need to wait for the arrival of large orders before starting production, but responds in a timely manner and produces on demand, which allows SHEIN to respond more flexibly to changes in market demand.

On the other hand, SHEIN has built a set of digital tools for the supply chain, which can monitor the situation of each link of the supply chain in real time and accurately predict market demand, so as to better adjust the production and supply chain processes and improve efficiency and accuracy. SHEIN provides suppliers with digital technology tools and creates full-link informatization, breaking the limitations of opaque information and untimely communication in the traditional clothing supply chain.

Not only that, SHEIN also carries out business coaching and training such as operation management, planning and development, production scheduling, operation and stocking, and quality management to ensure that suppliers can smoothly adapt to technological changes. In the first half of this year, SHEIN has carried out more than 240 new special trainings, and in 2023, SHEIN plans to carry out a total of 480 special trainings.

With the development and popularization of AI technology, "antique" garment manufacturing factories are expected to gradually adapt and apply AI technology to improve production efficiency and expand production capacity.

Sales: AI promotion volume

Compared with the AI applications on the design side and the manufacturing side, the AI applications on the sales side are more "conspicuous".

On the sales side, AI plays multiple roles, it is a smart matching tool, intelligent customer service, clothing models, and possibly e-commerce anchors, all of which work together to improve the convenience of shopping and provide a better shopping experience, thereby increasing sales and customer satisfaction.

For apparel brands, the emergence of various AI tools provides a feasible solution to "reduce costs and increase efficiency". For example, the use of intelligent customer service and intelligent matching tools can improve the user's experience of buying clothing. The use of AI clothing models and AI e-commerce anchors can better display the effect of clothing, and also reduce various costs of labor and rented venues.

Technology companies represented by Meitu have taken advantage of the trend and continuously launched and upgraded apparel AI applications to help apparel brands greatly improve marketing efficiency and save costs.

Meitu's Meitu Design Studio's AI commercial auction has launched functions such as "AI Clothing Color Change", "AI Product Image", and "AI Model Fitting", combined with Meitu Design Studio's "Smart Cutout", "E-commerce Poster" and other tools, to provide one-stop AI marketing services for clothing brands.

Coincidentally, artificial intelligence companies focusing on the integration of artificial intelligence and matching aesthetics love to match, and launched two major systems, namely the quantitative deconstruction system and the intelligent matching system of clothing aesthetics, advocating that AI learn the aesthetic characteristics of clothing, train AI into clothing stylists, and let everyone have AI stylists.

Whether it's Meitu's AI apparel matrix or Aidai's two AI dressing systems, they all use AI technology to help consumers better understand and choose the right clothing, improving the accuracy and efficiency of shopping. In other words, they all share the same goal of helping users better choose and match clothing, improve shopping convenience and satisfaction, and in turn promote sales.

Break the old order and reconstruct the new frontier of AI supply

AI is in vogue, the old order of the apparel supply chain is facing collapse, and the digital and intelligent collaboration of the omni-channel supply chain of the apparel industry is the trend of the times. According to the research and analysis of First New Voice, the digital market size of China's garment industry supply chain will reach 70.716 billion yuan in 2022, and will grow to 103.04 billion yuan by 2025, with a compound growth rate of 13.66% from 2020 to 2025.

First of all, the digital supply model based on AI, big data, cloud computing, Internet of Things and other technologies is expanding the boundaries of clothing supply.

The long-term cyclical nature of the supply chain restricts the speed of apparel enterprises to launch new products, and the digital supply model solves the problems of low supply chain efficiency and difficult management through real-time data sharing, predictive analysis, and supply chain optimization, so that apparel enterprises can respond to market demand more agilely and improve their competitiveness and profitability.

Secondly, the gradual formation of new channels, new marketing and new business formats driven by AI will further promote the upgrading and transformation of the apparel supply market.

The intervention of new technologies often triggers changes in traditional industries, and the application of AI technology to the apparel supply industry will bring more innovative and intelligent solutions. For example, consumers can get more personalized and accurate product recommendations through AI intelligent recommendation systems, and AI-based virtual fitting technology can provide online fitting services......

Of course, the relationship between AI and the apparel supply industry is mutually reinforcing. On the one hand, the apparel supply industry is one of the important application scenarios of AI technology, providing a "hotbed" for the landing and commercialization of AI technology. On the other hand, the continuous development of AI technology will also promote the transformation and upgrading of the apparel supply chain industry and broaden the boundaries of apparel supply.

To sum up, AI is penetrating into the design, manufacturing, and sales of apparel step by step, and the complex and inefficient traditional apparel supply chain will be deconstructed and improved by AI, while companies such as Meitu, Yunkuaishi, and SHEIN continue to explore the "AI + apparel supply chain" to create new value for brand merchants and consumers, and will also receive positive feedback.