Digital Fashion Platform Lingdi Technology Raises 200 Million Yuan in Pre-B Round, Anchored in Trillion-Yuan Apparel Industry
Driving technological innovation and industrial upgrading across China's apparel supply chain.
Lingdi Technology, a company providing 3D design SaaS tools, content, and supply chain fulfillment services for apparel businesses, recently announced the completion of a 200 million yuan Pre-B funding round. Gaorong Ventures led Lingdi's A+ round in early 2020 and co-led this round. The proceeds will primarily be used to build out the upstream and downstream apparel ecosystem and expand operations.
Lingdi addresses the most efficiency-constraining link in the industry — the design and development phase — offering products and services to brands, ODMs, and fabric and trim suppliers. These include: 1) 3D design tools with simulation rendering and an online collaboration platform that digitizes the entire apparel R&D process from fabric and trim selection to style design and rendering simulation, while accumulating substantial production parameters and structured product data assets along the way; and 2) digital BOMs generated according to factory production standards that connect manufacturing operations and打通 the full circulation chain in apparel, further driving digitalization across the entire industry. Lingdi has implemented a SEM (SaaS Enabled Marketplace) business model that combines characteristics of both SaaS and marketplace: on one hand, it provides software services through the SaaS model; on the other, through its design content and asset platform, it generates revenue from content and supply chain services when transactions involve two or more parties on the platform.
Connecting Design, Manufacturing, Display, and Sales to Boost Industry Efficiency Through Digitalization
Lingdi's core product is its self-developed 3D digital service platform, Style3D, which includes: 3D modeling software for apparel design and rendering tools that replace photography, serving brands and companies with design and development needs; Style3D Cloud, a full-process collaboration platform for design firms and ODMs to collaborate on designs and revisions; and a trend data and digital pattern content library. The company currently charges clients an annual SaaS subscription fee.
On the other hand, Lingdi operates a digital collaborative intelligent manufacturing platform that provides ODM services to apparel manufacturers by generating digital BOMs and distributing orders to partner factories. It charges based on supply chain delivery fulfillment. In 2020, Lingdi's software and supply chain revenue exceeded 200 million yuan, and it has established partnerships with numerous domestic and international mainstream apparel brands, designers, fabric suppliers, and ODM factories. The company has built an impressive roster of benchmark clients at home and abroad, including Septwolves, Lilanz, Ellassay, Broadcast, Purcotton, and OVS, as well as platform clients such as Tmall and Alibaba International. Beyond brands and apparel design houses, Lingdi has also established stable cooperation models with emerging companies in cross-border e-commerce (such as LightInTheBox and PATPAT) and livestream e-commerce (such as Chenfan E-commerce). Product R&D and supply chain efficiency improvement have become urgent needs for the apparel industry's efficiency upgrade, especially with the rise of livestream e-commerce and intensified market competition under normalized pandemic conditions, which have raised brands' demands for their own product development and supply chain coordination. Style3D's core functions include 3D design, online style modification, realistic display, online collaboration, and style management, forming a rich accumulation of data resources on the foundation of comprehensive digitalization, thereby improving product R&D and supply chain management efficiency.
Chen Liu, founder and CEO of Lingdi, noted: "Through continuous product refinement, we hope to make Style3D an industry-standard digital modeling and design software — as simple and accessible as Photoshop or Office — and to become the foundational tool and asset library for digitizing the physical world, with digital humans and apparel as representative applications." Additionally, Lingdi has honed its production processes through a model combining self-built and jointly-built design teams and ODM operations, taking on some orders generated from digital design, and assisting brands and design centers in establishing digital design centers. It provides complete supply chain solutions for small-to-medium brands and fast-fashion labels, achieving substantial improvements in industrial chain efficiency.
Rooted in China's Apparel Industry Foundation, Providing Industry Digitalization Solutions
China possesses the world's largest apparel industry chain foundation, with nearly one trillion yuan in manufacturing orders serving international brands annually. In recent years, a significant number of factories have shown trends toward international relocation and industrial upgrading. For the apparel industry to upgrade, it must achieve not only internal enterprise digitalization and online operations, but also inter-enterprise coordination and connectivity, forming a full-industry-chain collaborative network. Ultimately, through mining data relationships, it can achieve intelligence and drive efficiency gains across the entire industry chain. Liu further emphasized that China's apparel industry contains a trillion-scale industrial foundation, yet remains a typically fragmented market, making the value of digitalization immense for the sector. Lingdi is a company rooted in China's apparel industry foundation. Through product refinement, it has built moats in CAD, physical simulation, and rendering, driving content production from tools and extending through content to manufacturing, thereby forming an ecosystem. Currently, Lingdi has a team of nearly 170 people, with R&D staff accounting for roughly 65%. The company plans to establish subsidiaries in the United States, Hong Kong, and Europe to better serve clients and partners.
Gao Xiang, founding partner of Gaorong Ventures, stated: "With apparel 3D design at its core, Lingdi has precisely identified pain points in the industry chain, dramatically shortening product development cycles through its digital platform. At the same time, by further打通 collaborative manufacturing, digital marketing, and other links, it has built an industrial ecosystem with brands and merchants at the center, where designers, ODMs, fabric and trim suppliers, and collaborative factories all benefit. We have strong conviction in the Lingdi team and look forward to continued product refinement that helps drive technological innovation and industrial upgrading in China's apparel industry chain. Further out, we also look forward to seeing more applications of digital twin technology in apparel, and hope Lingdi will continue exploring more possibilities for digitizing the physical world."
Content source: 36Kr (edited and compiled)