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The Future of Fashion Is New End-To-End “Brand Operating System” Platforms
Creating and running a fashion brand is starting to look as simple as creating and running a social media account… tap to design, tap to price, tap to finance, tap to market, tap to make, tap to retarget. A new wave of software platforms is finally connecting all the machines and systems behind the scenes, and the effect is nothing short of revolutionary.
This new generation of integrated end-to-end platforms will mean tremendous opportunities for increases in efficiency at all levels of the fashion business, likely some significant consolidation after a bit of a race, and a new breed of top dog fashion magnates: gamers.
The fashion industry is for once at the leading edge of a technology boom, thanks largely to momentum and fallout from recent retail-tech and fit-tech gold rushes.
One year ago, economist Michel Mandel predicted that 2019 would be “the year of the manufacturing platform,” and apparently more than one person in the industry was listening.
Several established fashion equipment companies like Gerber Technology and EFI Optitex have been moving in this general direction for a while, and we’ve seen dashboards for dedicated applications like hiring and planning for media and events (Swipecast and CastingCoin), but the company suddenly at the forefront of the total unification pack is Cala, a New York-based SaaS startup which at the base pricing tier functions much like the others: a designer can log on, connect their e-commerce platform to the system, and use automation tools to manage their sourcing, manufacturing, and distribution. Other companies in the space include N.A.bld from Nineteenth Amendment, the powerful and industrial Resonance Companies’ MAKE and create.ONE platforms from partners Lawrence Lennihan and Joseph Ferrara, and ethical fashion platforms Thr3efold and Suuchi’s GRID. Together, they’re leaving pioneering platform of yesterday Maker’s Row seemingly in the dust.
Cala is the one that…
