Information Technology has become all pervasive, and the power of IT solutions assumes critical significance for businesses. This is true for the fashion industry as well. A ground breaking new solution will now help designers to create on-trend items in a way never before seen in the fashion industry. Driven and powered by cutting-edge technology developed by ITC Infotech, the solution is set to give savvy fashion houses a real competitive edge and get the latest lines to the high street much faster.
ITC Infotech’s Style Performance Analytics (SPA) technology uses historical data to predict future trends in fashion using an innovative combination of product attribute information, transactional Sales data and business intelligence. This provides a deeper understanding of styles and attributes most popular with customers, thus allowing designers to focus on what would be best suited for their customers.
SPA is based on the idea that a style is made up of a variety of attributes including colour, fabric, fit, trim and embellishments, among others, as purchase decisions are driven by one or more of these. SPA breaks down the style into its individual design attributes and ranks them according to their sales value. For the first time ever, crucial questions will be answered with extreme precision, like, for instance the reason behind the success of a certain style over another which did not witness the same kind of success. Visual dashboards enable designers and merchandisers to collate and understand how certain attributes affect the popularity of styles, aiding them in their decision-making process. itvoice
ITC Infotech’s Senior Vice-President – PLM and Engineering Services, Mr. V V Rajasekhar, explains the genesis of SPA. “When designing for the next season it would be fantastic to know how successful your design is going to be. We wanted a solution that could analyse past designs and bring out the aspects that have been popular and feed this information back into the design process. In this way the fashion line becomes more aligned to customer preferences.
Clearly, as a highly creative and unpredictable industry, fashion is driven by intangibles including the designer’s gut instinct about what will be popular.
However, Mr. Rajnish Kumar, Global Head – Softlines, ITC Infotech sees a more quantifiable side to the creative process. “There are external factors like inspiration from the catwalk, magazines and the current themes and trends, but there are also internal factors that have a bearing like the data from historical sales and customer preferences as well as the designer’s instinct. With SPA designers can remain creative while using the intelligence provided on successful attributes as the building blocks to augment the design process. The key is finding the attributes that the customers like and feeding them back into the design process.
ITC Infotech recently implemented leading PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) services provider PTC’s FlexPLM solution for Brooks Sports, a leading US based running company that designs and markets high-performance men’s and women’s running shoes, apparel and accessories in more than 40 countries worldwide. ITC Infotech and PTC have a long standing relationship that spans over a decade. ITC Infotech helps PTC implement its projects around the globe, providing end-to-end services and support. ITC Infotech’s expertise in PLM is unparalleled, with over 850 implementations of PTC PLM products.
