Like fintech to the financial system, fashion-tech poses an existential challenge to twentieth-century materialism – and an opportunity. Smashing together the rise of environmentalism with innovations in technology and customer solutions, it isn’t just changing the way that what we wear is produced; it’s changing the way we think about it. Underpinning the sector is the fashion e-commerce market – worth $481 billion in 2018 and expected to rise to $713 billion by 2022. Year to date, European fashion-tech startups have raised €440 million, fuelling an ecosystem set to go from strength to strength.
We wanted to take a look at the European market, and the trends emerging for a more sustainable, creative, and stylish future.
Below are our 37 top picks: companies that are predominantly at Series A or B (although a couple are still at seed stage) and that are actively helping to define and shape this exciting category.
Here are the ones to watch out for in 2022:
1. The Fabricant
The Fabricant is a fashion house aiming to create digital-only fashion. From creating immersive brand experiences to selling unique garments via the blockchain, this company aims to transition fashion from the purely physical to the digital realm. The Fabricant has partnered with brands like Puma, Adidas, Underarmour, and Tommy Hilfiger.
Founders: Kerry Murphy, Amber Slooten, Adriana Hoppenbrouwer
Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2. Presize
Presize is an AI that offers sizing solutions to retailers with the goal of reducing customer returns due to incorrect sizing. The Size Recommendation program combines data and shopping behavior to provide advanced fitting information for context. Integrated with online platforms, the program also tracks improvements in return and conversion rate for each product. The Body Measurements program provides accurate body measurements with up to 20 different measurement points via scanning. Precise has more than 850,000 users. Investors include Dr. Heiko Schäfer, COO HUGO BOSS Group, and Christina Rosenberg, ex-CEO of Hermès Paris GmbH.
Founders: Leon Szeli, Tomislav Tomov, Awais Shafique
Location: Munich, Germany
3. Vividye
Vividye has developed a printing technology that can be used to apply colors and designs to textiles. It is designed to facilitate the removal of the applied color without harming the material, making it possible to recolor textiles over and over again. The company wants to provide an alternative to fast fashion by prolonging the life of garments and putting creativity in the hands of the user. In May 2021, Vivideye placed in the top 14 finalists in Business Challenge’s pitch competition, allowing the startup to receive greater support.
Founders: Johanna Nissén Karlsson, Gustav Larsson-Utas
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
4. Outfittery
Outfittery provides a personalized shopping experience for men. Users answer a few questions about their style, sizing and price preferences, and a stylist will select items to send. Then, customers keep the items they like and send the rest back. The whole process is done online and provides clothing from around 300 brands. Since it was founded in 2012, it has raised over €50 million in funding, employs over 300 people, and has served 600,000 customers as of 2018.
Founders: Julia Bösch
Location: Berlin, Germany
5. Safesize
Founded in 2012, Safesize offers an alternative to trying on shoes in-store. Using 3D technology, Safesize creates a scan of the user’s foot and matches it with a database of 3D-scanned shoes to help the customer find the best match for them. In 2019, the startup raised €10 million in a Series B round from existing investors 3TS Capital Partners and Convent Capital, as well as additional strategic investors.
Founders: Angelos Stavrakis
Location: Almere, The Netherlands
6. Intelistyle
Intelistyle uses AI to analyze the latest designer releases and social media to understand the latest fashion trends. Using the customer’s style and preferences, Intelistyle provides outfit recommendations from their existing wardrobe and retail partners with the goal of personalizing the customer experience both in-store or online. The company was launched in 2017 and raised €534,000 in a seed round led by Metavallon VC in 2018.
Founders: Kostas Koukoravas and Michael Michelis
Location: London, UK
7. Project Cece
Female-founded Project Cece launched in 2017 to make ethical fashion more readily accessible to consumers. It uses an online aggregator to collect products from more than 300 ethical fashion stores and fair trade brands, resulting in 25,000 products. In 2019, the startup raised a funding round from ASIF Ventures, a student-run VC that invests in young and student entrepreneurs and officially launched in the UK the same year.
Founders: Noor Veenhoven, Melissa Wijngaarden, Marcella Wijngaarden
Location: Amsterdam, Netherlands
8. Depop
Depop is a peer-to-peer social e-commerce platform that allows users to buy and sell clothing and accessories. It is available as an app on iOS and Android users and boasts 21 million users as of 2021. In 2020, Depop's gross merchandise sales and revenue both more than doubled to $650 million and $70 million, respectively. Etsy also acquired the platform for $1.6 billion this year, but announced that it would continue to operate as a standalone brand.
Founders: Simon Beckerman
Location: London, UK
9. Unmade
Unmade is a fashion and sportswear software company that offers an operating platform to directly connect customer demand to production. Its goal is to limit waste by manufacturing on demand. In its Series A funding round, Unmade raised £4.75 million. In 2020, the company received new investment from Maersk Growth, the corporate venture arm of the global leader in transport and logistics, A.P. Moller – Maersk. This investment also follows those from Octopus Ventures and MMC Ventures.
Founders: Hal Watts, Kirsty Emery, Ben Alun-Jones
Location: London, UK
10. Material Exchange
Material Exchange is a fashion technology company founded in 2017. The startup built an analytics platform used by apparel and footwear retailers to analyze, optimize and digitize their material sourcing and development processes. The database has around 40,000 digital materials and customers include Steve Madden, Kingpins Denim, and Global Brands Group. In 2020, the company completed a funding round of €5 million, led by Norrsken VC and Partech. Other contributors in the round included existing shareholder Inventure and Day One and Lyra Ventures.
Founders: Darren Glenister
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
11. Vestiaire Collective
Vestiaire Collective is a social commerce platform where users buy and sell luxury, pre-owned fashion. The company’s goal is to improve sustainability in the fashion industry by promoting buying second-hand or vintage. In March 2021, it was granted “unicorn” status after securing €178 million in a funding round backed by the global French luxury group Kering, and US investment firm Tiger Global Management.
Founders: Alexandre Cognard, Fanny Moizant, Henrique Fernandes, Sebastien Fabre, Sophie Hersan
Location: Paris, France
12. Otrium
Otrium offers brands the option to list their end-of-season items with the goal of limiting excess waste. With Otrium, brands can add another sales channel for items that would otherwise be destroyed or discarded. In March, the company raised a $120 round led by BOND and Index Ventures, just a year after raising its $26 million Series B round.
Founders: Milan Daniels, Max Klijnstra
Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
13. Prevayl
Prevayl launched November this year in the UK with a line of fitness “smart” shirts, accompanied by an app and an online community designed for athletes. In June, the brand secured €8.7 million in an investment round from Stonebridge, the digital-first consumer brand investment firm.
Founders: Adam Crofts, David Newns
Location: Manchester, UK
14. Piñatex
Piñatex developed by Ananas Anam Ltd., is a natural leather alternative made from pineapple leaf fiber. It is a sustainable sourced, non-woven textile made from the by-product of existing agricultural practices. It has multiple uses, including fashion apparel, bags, footwear, watch straps, and car seat furnishing. Founded in 2012, the company secured €250,000 in new funding this year from the Greater London Investment Fund.
Founders: Carmen Hijosa
Location: London, UK
15. Zalando
Zalando is a fashion and technology company, transformed into a multi-service platform. It offers fashion and lifestyle products to customers in 23 European markets. Zalando has raised a total of $615.9 million in funding over eight rounds.
Founders: Robert Gentz, David Schneider
Location: Berlin, Germany
16. Combyne
Combyne is an app for combining clothing so users can create new and unique outfits. Founded in 2014, the company has raised €6.9 million over six rounds. Investors include Plug and Play Tech Center and Red Hook Capital.
Founders: Philipp Seybold, Christian Dienst, Pung Worathiti Manosroi
Location: Munich, Germany
17. Heuritech
Heuritech is a technology company that provides predictive analytics on trends to fashion and lifestyle brands. The AI platform analyzes images on social media and turns them into insights for businesses. Founded in 2013, the company raised €1.1 million in 2016, followed by €4 million in 2019. Heuritech also won the LVMH Innovation Award: a solution dedicated to luxury in 2017.
Founders: Tony Pinville, Charles Ollion
Location: Paris, France
18. Miinto
Miinto connects fashion boutiques and designers across Europe and includes more than 1,800 brands. In 2021, the startup crossed €135 million in sales and secured a further €20 million investment from Anders Holch Povlsen, the billionaire behind the clothing retailer Bestseller.
Founders: Konrad Kierklo, Mike Radoor
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
19. Stylight
Founded in 2008, Stylight is an online aggregator for fashion, beauty, and design. The platform includes 1,500 online shops in 16 countries, and compares prices of more than 65,000 brands. Stylight has raised a total of $1.7 million in funding over four rounds. SevenVentures and HV Capital are the most recent investors.
Founders: Anselm Bauer, Benjamin Guenther, Max-Josef Meier, Sebastian Schuon
Location: Munich, Germany
20. UNOWN
UNOWN is an e-commerce website where users can lease sustainable premium fashion or subscribe monthly. The company offers fashion-as-a-service and enables brands to secure a share in the leasing market as they lease out their assets through the revenue share model. In 2020, the company secured €750,000 from investors including Übermorgen Ventures and APX, and most recently in 2021 they raised over €1 million.
Founders: Linda Ahrens, Tina Spießmacher
Location: Hamburg, Germany
21. Fashion Cloud
Fashion Cloud is a B2B digital platform connecting retailers and brands in the fashion industry. More than 500 brands across 85 companies are currently participating in the network. Fashion Cloud has gone through three rounds of funding, the latest was raised in 2019 from a Series B round. The company acquired Stockbase in July 2021. Its estimated annual revenue is currently $8.1 million per year.
Founders: Florian Klemt, Martin Brücher, René Schnellen
Location: Hamburg, Germany
22. Psykhe
Psykhe aims to personalize online shopping through its recommendation engine, powered by machine learning. Psyche operates as an RaaS platform and users take a quiz to get started. In October 2020, the company secured $1.7 million in seed funding from Carmen Busquets, SLS Journey, John Skipper, and Lara Vanjak.
Founders: Anabel Maldonado
Location: London, UK
23. Retraced
Retraced is a software for sustainability management. The platform allows users to visualize, verify, and communicate their supply chains, as well as manage their CSR efforts. In February 2021, the fashion blockchain startup raised €1 million in seed funding from European VC firm Samaipata.
Founders: Philipp Mayer, Lukas Puender, Peter Merket
Location: Düsseldorf, Germany
24. Hack Your Closet
Hack Your Closet is an e-commerce website for the first shared, sustainable closet in Europe. The website matches garments with customers’ style preferences and circulates the clothes each month using exclusively second-hand items, overstocks, samples, or dead stocks. Closets are available in Sweden and France. Launched in 2019, Sweden secured $2.2 million in a round of financing led by Pale Blue Dot Ventures and followed by existing shareholders, including J12 Ventures, and Luminar Ventures.
Founders: Lisa Gautier, Mikaela Larsell Ayesa
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
25. Wearfits
Wearfits utilities augmented reality and machine learning applied to 3D visualization, virtual try-on, and size fitting for clothing and footwear to increase sales and reduce returns. Using a “virtual fitting room” shoppers can try on digital clothes online and in AR. The company is currently in its seed round and received €529,308 from the EU’s European Regional Development Fund in February last year.
Founders: Katarzyna Burda, Krzysztof Hrycak, Łukasz Rzepecki
Location: Kraków, Poland
26. Ecoalf
Created in 2012, Ecoalf is a sustainable fashion brand that specializes in innovating recycled clothing. The brand aims to develop recycled products with the same level of quality and design as non-recycled products available. In late 2020 the company secured €4 million financing from Eurofactor.
Founders: Javier Goyeneche, Andrés Lopez
Location: Madrid, Spain
27. xNomad
xNomad is a marketplace for short-term retail space connecting brands and e-commerce stores to popup spaces. Launched in 2019, the platform is in its seed round, securing funding from SF Invest, Almi Invest, and Propel Capital last year.
Founders: Jonathan Haralambakis, Leslie Maunsbach
Location: Stockholm, Sweden
28. Lalaland
Lalaland uses AI to create synthetic, photo-realistic human fashion models for eCommerce brands with the goal of modeling diverse populations and consumer bases. Launched in 2019, the company is backed by ASIF Ventures and ACE Incubator and received support from Google’s Black Founders Fund.
Founders: Harold Smeeman, Michael Musandu
Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
29. Lyst
Lyst is a personalized fashion marketplace that allows its 150 million users to search and access stores. The platform features more than 8 million products across 17,000 brands. Since its launch in 2010, it has raised about $70 million and was listed as one of the most downloaded premium fashion IOS apps globally in 2021.
Founders: Chris Morten
Location: London, UK
30. Threads Styling
On Threads Styling, users can reach stylists through text and social media who provide styling advice and recommendations. Since its launch in 2009, the service has raised about $20 million in funding.
Founders: Sophie Hill
Location: London, UK
31. Ankorstore
Ankorstore is a European marketplace that connects brands and creators with retailers. Launched in 2019, they enable e-commerce brands to sell through small businesses, and merchants to sell things that aren't typically available in big box stores. Most recently in May 2021, the business raised $102 million through its Series B funding round.
Founders: Monika Holod, Pierre Louis Lacoste
Location: Paris, France
32. Edited
Edited uses AI-driven market and enterprise intelligence to fuel automation. By connecting business analytics and external market data, brands can learn more about products and pricing. Companies like Columbia and Inditex have used Edited. The company has raised about $35 million in funding.
Founders: Julia Fowler, Geoff Watts
Location: London, UK
33. LoveCrafts
LoveCrafts is designed for those who love knitwear. Users can find the required materials for knitting, crocheting, and sewing. Making clothes instead of buying them reduces waste and is more environmentally sustainable. Founded in 2013, the platform has raised about $75.2 million in funding over six rounds.
Founders: Nigel Whiteoak, Cherry Freeman, Edward Griffith
Location: London, UK
34. TropicFeel
Established in 2017, TropicFeel invests insustainable travel footwear. The company donates a portion of its profits to national parks to ensure that every step taken leaves a good footprint.In May 2021 the brand raised €2,000,000 during their Series A funding.
Founders: Alberto Espinós, Kike Corral
Location: Barcelona, Spain
35. NearSt.
NearSt. uses real-time location technology to connect users to any shop inventory system and the raw stock turns into quality live inventory. Customers looking up businesses on Google can see what’s in stock directly in the search results. Google can also automatically show a shop’s products in the top results to shoppers searching nearby. The startup has raised a total of £5.2 million since its founding in 2015.
Founders: Max Kreijn, Nick Brackenbury, Thomas Schloffen
Location: London, UK
36. Dressipi
Dressipi accesses real-time insights to optimize value during the merchandising and buying processes by using fashion specific-AI and machine learning. Its APIs integrate into existing enterprise platforms so businesses can drive growth across their value chains and keep up with market trends. Founded in 2009, the company has gone through multiple rounds of funding, its most recent being a $566,000 grant in August 2017.
Founders: Sarah McVittie, Donna North
Location: London, UK
37. Heist Studios
Heist Studios designs tights and shapewear using sportswear technology. The company also focuses on sustainability using recyclable material and packaging. Heist Studios is a Series B startup that has raised a total of $8.1 million through nine investors. In 2018, the company raised $4.4 million from Firstminute Capital, JamJar, Pembroke VCT and other existing investors.
Founders: Toby Darbyshire
Location: London, UK
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