Build It Series Recap: My Top 5 Fashion Tech Insights with Peter Jeun Ho Tsang

We wrap up our 'Build It' podcast series with a reflective finale. Host Peter Jeun Ho Tsang tell us his top 5 key takeaways from navigating business growth, how to get through challenging times as a fashion tech startup, through to tech and humans coming together. This episode highlights the passionate voices featured throughout the series and how the call for a strategic collaboration between brands, investors, and innovators to not only sustain emerging technologies but to also foster their growth. This episode isn't just a summary; it's a map charting the path forward in the fashion tech realm.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Fashion Tech Innovations and Insights
• 11:08 Podcast Recap and Future Series Launch

Transcript

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 0:00

Hello, I'm Peter Jeun Ho Tsang, founder and CEO of Beyond Form, and welcome to the special series Build It, where I speak to founders and their clients as to how they're building fashion technologies. This series gives you a glimpse into topics such as personal struggles, technical challenges, working in fashion and more. So there we have it, the end of the build it series, where we unpacked many innovations and startups and their clients as to how they're building out their fashion tech solutions. So I just wanted to finish off this series by recapping my top five key takeaways from all the guest interviews that we've had in this particular series. We've had a variety of guest speakers, ranging everything from manufacturing through to fashion designers, through to fashion technologists, people from inside and outside of the fashion space, and it has created a whole melting pot of all of these different themes which I've just found so fascinating and interesting. The fact that some of us guest speakers have been from all over the world as well has given of all of these different themes which I've just found so fascinating and interesting. The fact that Salah's guest speakers have been from all over the world as well has given a different perspective as to how things are being done differently in different parts of the world. So let me get started with key takeaway number one.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 1:19

We heard from Abdul, ceo of WiMetrix, and his two clients at AM Group, and also Shakham Industries, and the key takeaway that I took from this was actually Pakistan is a goldmine for manufacturing, a burgeoning location for Western brands and non-Western brands as well, but the fact that these factories are being boosted by data, by solutions such as WeMetrix, giving the fashion brand or the fashion manufacturer very key granular detail as to what's happening in their factories and therefore seeing how they can optimize it. What does this mean? Mean? It means that you can get more productivity, you can get more efficiency and ultimately making better profit margins for the fashion brands. That this means that manufacturers can pass on this advantage to them. However, we also heard from shahad, but who is from shackham. Industry is not necessarily just one stakeholder that is required to make the supply chain of the manufacturing industry more sustainable or more optimized or more modern, but it will take a variety of collaborations to make that happen. It's about working hand in hand with them. Action point for any listeners that are potentially looking for new manufacturing facilities go to Pakistan. Go to the manufacturers that are boosted by data solutions such as WeMetrix, so that you can understand what's happening in these factories. I've got to be less scared with working with manufacturers in this location.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 2:59

Key takeaway number two we heard from Brian, who is the CEO of New York Culture Club based, of course, in New York, as the name suggests with his fashion IoT solution. My key takeaway actually here is less about the company itself, but him as an entrepreneur and what we do as entrepreneurs. We heard how he got scammed trying to finance his fashion tech startup and, unfortunately, he took a loan, or what he thought was a loan, but turned out to be a scam, and he advanced that loan as well. A key takeaway from this episode and his story is, of course, yes, a do your due diligence. But, most importantly, when you are in a situation where you're trying to get your start going as quickly as possible, it's just to take that time to step back and reflect. Actually, is the solution legitimate? Who can I draw upon in terms of advisors to see, okay, does this solution seem the right path to go in? And what he talked about there in the episode is okay if you are in a situation as an entrepreneur that is not favourable and things do go wrong, instead of making a big hoo-ha about it publicly from the get-go, is just to decompress for however long you need whether that's two days or one week which you did, reflect upon it and think, okay, what learnings can I take from this to build myself as an entrepreneur? As entrepreneurs, we all make mistakes, that's a given. We're all trying to do a million things and then all the time. So how can we make sure that, if we are in a position where it's been less fortunate is, how do we regulate our emotions and take something from it? Key takeaway number two there is to regulate yourself.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 4:52

Key takeaway number three takes us to the west coast of the usa, where we heard from Chelsea the CEO of Laundered our repair platform. Now she's been trying to raise for her fashion tech company over the last couple of months and she told us the story of actually how old men in grey suits were not just getting her idea of actually how old men in grey suits were not just getting her idea. Now, my key takeaway to this is the fact that there's nothing wrong with her idea or her startup, but it's about pitching to the right audience with a pitch deck that's suitable. But also thinking about actually, is my potential idea or story going to be received by these people in the way that I want it to be, and actually are these people the right audience in the first place? She described in that episode actually how a lot of the investors that she approached gave her lip service, and we've all encountered this previously, where we get unsolicited, polite advice as to what they think they should be doing with the startup but ultimately this is just lip service. So key takeaway number three is, if you are fundraising, if you are pitching, think about am I reaching to the right person in the right time and in the right context? Once you have all of that preparation and planning done, it's going to make your fundraising journey a lot more smoother. Key takeaway number four we had back on the show Beatrice Newman, who we previously had on the podcast show. She is now our head of education at BeyondFoam, which we announced during this podcast series With Bitches.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 6:43

We talked about embracing failure and also pivoting in fashion business as well. Key takeaway here is that it's okay to fail. It's okay to have a false start or stumble along the way. Quite often in fashion, we're always thinking about the perfect versions of ourselves having that glossy veneer because you know it is fashion, but behind the scenes, it's okay to not always have that facade creeping in as well, and it's about knowing when to stop and going. Okay, this is not working. How can I pivot? Or, in some cases, how have I failed? How can I learn from that and move from it?

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 7:25

In the case of Beatrice, she gave us the story about how, with her own fashion brand, colicky, she was doing. What we've all been taught at fashion school is to create a fashion collection of 10, 12, 20 looks, however many pieces it may be. Push it out into the world and see what happens. That does not make for the backbone of a credible fashion business. She took those learnings. Actually, what fashion school teaches you and we're not missing fashion schools in any way, because they're for educational purposes but how can you apply it in a different way from a commercial perspective? She basically pivoted her fashion business to be a lot more digital, forward, speaking to her customers on social media and ultimately go with a business model which allowed her to grow organically.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 8:13

Fashion business is not always going about as fast as possible, or even business in general. It's about taking your time and making sure that you know where you're heading with your business. And I always like to reference night, which was previously called blue ribbon, and if you've ever read shoe dog, you'll know that it took him quite a while to get night going off the ground and some of the struggles. What we see in the media, what we see PR wise, is normally the end point, and most founders don't tell you all of those battles that they go through to get to that end point. It's about wearing your battle scars with pride, learning from it and then moving forward with your fashion business or your entrepreneurial journey.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 8:59

And finally, key takeaway number five we had on the show Pritesh and his startup solution based in Seattle, ai Mir, which is to develop a pig fit solution and augmented reality virtual try-on. We learn here that data is super powerful, and we'll hear more about this in next week's episode where we recap what's happened in 2024 in fashion tech. However, my key takeaway here is that for anything that is using AI or giving recommendations or anything along those lines, the data itself has to be truthful and, as we heard from our guest speaker, katie, if that data isn't truthful, it's not going to give you the results that you want to achieve. So for any fashion tech founders that are starting a fashion tech solution that is centered around AI and data you want to think about what is the quality of your data? How can you use that data in a way that is beneficial for the fashion industry, to reveal the truths that need to be taught?

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 10:11

So, for example, in the episode with katie, we discussed actually how most solutions and how most fashion brands are not fitting their garments or their products for the older generation, and she gave a red point in an example about how she's seen many clients coming to be fitted for their final suit before they pass away. Now we're only going to reach that point at some point, but in most cases, the way products are fitted at the moment and designed it is for a fully abled, very person in their younger days. So how do we cater for the older generations? And at the moment, there's a lot missing in terms of data, in terms of the way we do things in fit within fashion, how we design products. So you need to really make sure that we're not baking in those biases or those blind spots into our companies.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang: 11:08

So there you have it, my top five key takeaway from the Build it series. I've hope you enjoyed this series. I'd be really interested to know which parts you did like, which you didn't like. If you have any feedback, please do email us. At podcast at beyondformio, on next week's episode, we will be recapping what's happened in 2024 and we'll be launching a new series in 2025 very, very soon.