Fermat will provide New Look’s Buying and Design teams with AI-powered tools designed to speed-up the product development process. New Look’s design team will be able to create virtual product prototypes, trial multiple design versions and assess various styling alternatives.
The womenswear brand said this will enhance designers’ ability to experiment with ideas, respond more rapidly to customer preferences and support the continued adaptation of New Look’s product range.
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Integrating Fermat’s platform will also enable New Look to reduce its reliance on traditional physical sampling procedures, which could improve efficiency and sustainability in product development.
“Fermat gives our designers the freedom to bring ideas to life faster, explore more creative possibilities and refine products through multiple iterations before they reach the customer,” explained New Look’s creative director Anica Wislawski.
“More importantly, it allows us to remove time from parts of the design process and reinvest it where human creativity matters most: understanding our customer, identifying what they’ll want next and thinking about how they’ll wear and style it.”
The update forms part of a broader move by New Look to embed data, AI and digital technologies within its Buying and Design divisions.
The retailer said it is combining customer insights with trend analysis and technological investment to spot new trends and deliver relevant products to the market more efficiently.
Last year, New Look secured a £30m ($40m) investment from its shareholders to help accelerate digital transformation and improve its online operations.
The business plans further spending on data infrastructure, AI and e-commerce systems, with the aim of offering a smoother, more tailored experience for the 10 million customers in its database.
At that time, New Look revealed its goal to double its digital orders from £500m to £1bn by 2030 and to achieve a 10% share of the online market by the 2028 financial year.
Meanwhile, the retailer is also leveraging insights gathered from Club New Look, its customer loyalty programme, to inform its wider digital and data strategies.
Club New Look has surpassed one million members, contributing to the retailer’s understanding of consumer behaviour and preferences.
“By combining creative instinct, customer insight, and AI-powered tools, we’re able to make more informed decisions and shape trends into wearable ideas that work in everyday life. It strengthens the golden thread from concept to customer, helping us create better products, better outfits and ultimately more confidence for our customer,” Wislawski added.
