Ergin Aydın, President of the Textile Exporters and Workers Association (TİHCAD), stated that artificial intelligence technologies offer significant time and cost advantages in the textile and fashion industry. Aydın noted that the global AI market in textiles is expected to reach 4.9 billion dollars by 2026, adding: “It is used in many areas, from production planning to quality control, from design to supply chain optimization. Around 45% of textile manufacturers benefit from these technologies to improve quality control.” He noted that while AI enhances maintenance and automation efficiency on the production side, it is also used in retail for demand forecasting, inventory management, and personalized marketing.
Stating that the traditional collection development cycle from design to store delivery can take 8–12 months, Aydın explained: “AI-supported digital design can significantly shorten this process. For instance, 3D digital design and sampling reduce design approval times from weeks to mere hours. While sewing a physical sample and sending it to the customer may take weeks, preparing and presenting a digital prototype is almost instantaneous. Over the past five years, delivery times for clothing products have been cut in half, but traditional sampling has remained just as slow, creating a bottleneck in the process.”
“Digital sampling dramatically reduces per-sample production costs”
Aydın pointed out that the use of AI in textile product development accelerates design times by an average of 40% and increases the speed at which collections reach the market. He added: “Digital sampling dramatically lowers per-sample production costs. Analyses reveal that digital sample usage can achieve up to 60% savings in development costs. Globally, the fashion footwear industry produces around 14 billion pairs of shoes every year, with an average of 13 samples created for each model. Most of these end up as waste, placing a burden on the environment. With digital samples, it is possible to eliminate most of these unnecessary prototypes.”
3D technology prevents material waste
Aydın further noted that in the ready-to-wear industry, millions of produced items are discarded every year: “Looking at the figures, a quarter of this waste each year comes from sample products that were only displayed once or twice before being shelved. This striking data shows how resource-intensive the physical sample-based design process truly is. With AI and 3D technologies, brands can now approve collections with just one ‘master’ sample—or, in some cases, make decisions entirely based on digital prototypes without producing any physical samples.” He also emphasized that, according to the United Nations Alliance for Sustainable Fashion, producing a digital clothing prototype generates 97% less carbon emissions compared to a physical prototype.