Author: Marc Bain
OXFORDSHIRE, United Kingdom — We’re living through a moment of global upheaval. Governments are contending with seismic shifts in trade and geopolitics. Corporations and their workforces are grappling in real-time with how to adapt to advances in artificial intelligence. Vulnerable communities from LGBTQ groups to immigrants are facing a rise in hate and exclusion. At the first session of VOICES 2025, the tenth anniversary of BoF’s annual gathering of big thinkers, speakers from actor and activist Riz Ahmed to designers Clare Waight Keller and Maria Cornejo addressed these and other issues as they examined the wider world. Despite the gravity…
Gap is turning the lights back on in its London flagship.After it closed all its UK locations in a broad restructuring in 2021, the American brand is reopening its store in London’s Covent Garden neighbourhood on Friday. The new shop is one of three planned: Another in Wembley and one in the Westfield shopping centre in White City open their doors in December.The space in Covent Garden has sat dormant since Gap closed the store, and is typically papered over with Gap advertising. The company owns the building, and because it didn’t have to pay tax on the location if…
A typical Walmart store manager might oversee a staff of 350 people, who they are frequently hiring, firing and promoting. One thing they don’t want to worry about is figuring out how to make all those changes in the retailer’s HR system. So Walmart built an AI agent that does the job for them. “All they have to do now is go to the associate super agent, issue the request and type in ‘promote associate’ and it allows them to use the agent on the back end to complete that HR transaction without human intervention,” Ben Peterson, the company’s vice…
Going forward, this newsletter will only be available to BoF Professional members as part of our Expert Perspectives series. I promise you it’s worth it — on top of my musings, you’ll get to peek inside the brains of my fabulous colleagues Mike Sykes, Priya Rao and Sarah Kent, who have you covered for everything you need to know on sports, beauty and sustainability. And there’s still more to come. If you want in, subscribe here.Dear BoF Community,Welcome to Tech Mode, your monthly roundup of the tech-fashion news you need to know.First, in just a few weeks The Business of…
Welcome to Tech Mode, your monthly roundup of the tech-fashion news you need to know.In this edition, we’ll get into what’s going to happen to TikTok and its addictive algorithm, the reviews — including my own — of the new Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses and the lack of outrage at Valentino’s and Vans’ new AI campaign.Let’s jump in.TikTok’s New OwnersLet’s make a deal: After months of TikTok hanging in legal and political limbo in the US, it seems the fate of the video-sharing app and one of fashion’s favourite advertising platforms is becoming clear. While the final details are to…
Highsnobiety is calling an end to its days as a multi-brand retailer.The company announced Tuesday that it will wind down its e-commerce business by the end of the year and focus on its core operations, namely its publishing arm, which made it an influential voice in sneakers and streetwear, and the creative and advisory services it offers to brands.As part of the restructuring, the business will cut roughly 50 jobs from its total workforce of about 275, including roles in departments such as finance and technology that were related to its retail operations.Highsnobiety launched e-commerce in 2019, looking to translate…
The next technological era has arrived.Analysts and tech futurists tend to align in the belief that, like the internet and social media before it, artificial intelligence is poised to reshape operations across fashion companies. It isn’t just one or two departments it will touch; it’s all of them, as AI influences everything from how companies create and market their products to how they manage their workforces and interact with customers.To adapt to this new moment, executives across fashion organisations must have a clear grasp of AI’s capabilities and how to apply them. But while many are aware of the latest…
The next technological era has arrived.Analysts and tech futurists tend to align in the belief that, like the internet and social media before it, artificial intelligence is poised to reshape operations across fashion companies. It isn’t just one or two departments it will touch; it’s all of them, as AI influences everything from how companies create and market their products to how they manage their workforces and interact with customers.To adapt to this new moment, executives across fashion organisations must have a clear grasp of AI’s capabilities and how to apply them. But while many are aware of the latest…
The first moment the new Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses impressed me was when, shortly after learning the hand gesture to change the volume on the audio, I caught myself turning it down without a second thought.The selling point of the glasses is that they’re the first in the partnership between Meta and Ray-Ban to include an internal display digitally overlaid on the wearer’s field of view, bringing the companies a step closer to their dream of full augmented-reality glasses. But how the wearer interacts with that display feels like the biggest innovation.The glasses pair with a wristband that measures electrical…
Subscribe to Tech Mode with Marc Bain, a deep dive into the most intriguing developments in artificial intelligence and its impact on the fashion industry.Welcome to the relaunch of The Business of Fashion’s Technology Newsletter. We’re calling it Tech Mode, and here’s what you can expect: We’re introducing a new format designed to fill you in on the important news at the intersection of technology and fashion once a month. There’s an endless stream of updates to follow, and it’s hard to keep up with it all, so you won’t have to. You’ll get a quick download of the bits…