How is it that with all the technology available that clothing retailers and brands have not been able to standardize their sizing so a size large is a large wherever you shop?
Aistetic, an Oxford University technology spinout, has developed an innovative AI solution that provides 3D body measurements and recommendations to solve the problem. Aistetic’s software plugs into existing brands’ and retailers’ websites and apps so people can get their measurements and size for that specific retailer before purchasing. People can shop with confidence using this technology with any mobile phone.
In one store, you could be a medium, in another a large and in another extra-large.
The result: people are buying and then returning lots of clothing. This can be as high as 50 percent in some countries. Returns have been the profit drag to retailers growing online businesses and an environmental drain of the polluting fashion sector which the United Nations estimates as contributing 10 percent of the world’s pollution.
Some people regularly buy one size up and one size down with the intention of returning the two items that don’t fit. Returning items has a knock-on effect which involves registering the return, taking it to the post office, or making a trip back to the store. This all adds up, in time, energy and in the cost of the carbon impact it has.
Aistetic has seen recently how ChatGPT-3 has demonstrated useful capabilities of AI. Computer vision and machine learning can deliver 98 percent body measurement accuracy from a phone. It’s as simple as doing a 360-degree turn in front of your phone to capture your 3D body reconstruction with all your personal measurements. Aistetic then matches and calibrates your size to that retailer and saves it for future purchases as your size profile (this is done in accordance with general data protection regulations).
Aistetic was founded in 2019 by Duncan McKay, INSEAD MBA and Phil Torr, Professor of Computer Vision & Deep Learning at the University of Oxford. It has been awarded two Innovate U.K. Grants, and one Future Fashion Factory Grant in partnership with the University of Leeds For information, contact McKay at duncan@aistetic.com or visit the website, https://www.aistetic.com/
