Award-winning Sustainable Fashion Startup Develops 3D Weaving Technology to Reduce Textile Waste

With Hong Kong’s robust support for startups, unspun joins locally funded incubation programmes.

unspun, a venture-backed fashion tech startup founded in 2015, aims to provide solutions to reduce inventory, unsold stock and textile waste in the fashion industry.

Currently producing only denim jeans, the company also plans to gradually expand its apparel product range. unspun describes themselves as a “robotic and apparel company” with a mission to reduce global carbon emission by minimising overproduction through automising, localising and intentional manufacturing. Its self‑developed digital fit algorithms and 3D‑weaving machine automate production process while enabling customisation and on-demand production.

The founders studied together in San Francisco Bay Area, and the company set up its office in Hong Kong in 2017 with a focus on business development, marketing and customer services. Walden Lam, Co-Founder, thinks that the city has great potential to grow their business. He said, “Many global sourcing offices are based in Hong Kong, with an entire ecosystem of buyers and suppliers. We can easily reach out to many decision makers along the whole garment supply chain by establishing a local presence.”

unspun has already started to operate their e-Commerce business, and opened five pop-up stores around the city last year. “It is an excellent location for us as a Fashion Tech company to try out bricks and mortar retailing and to interact with the consumers, we have had very positive feedback from both locals and overseas visitors.” Lam said, adding that the team is also planning to launch more physical retail stores in other locations next year and is keen on exploring other markets in the region, such as Japan.

In 2018, unspun was selected as one of the startups to join the Mills Fabrica’s 12-month business Incubation Programme that supports techstyle fashion and textile startups. According to Lam, the programme has created valuable business and networking opportunities for apparel startups in addition to providing financial support. “Riding on this opportunity, it opens up the entire fashion ecosystem for us,” Lam said, “we were introduced to many Hong Kong-based fashion brands and supply chain enterprises and we look forward to the possibility of collaborating with them.”

Lam advised entrepreneurs who would like to set up a business in Hong Kong to leverage assistance provided by the government and private corporations. “Hong Kong has a favourable startup environment, thanks to its abundant startup support and well-developed IT infrastructure. No matter at which stage of the business, a company can always find the support they need.”

Lam also sees InvestHK as a useful resource for startups. “With a strong global network, Invest Hong Kong is an excellent source and platform for sharing the latest industry information,” he concluded.