By Wenzhou News Network – As part of the implementation of the new three-year action plan for large incubator clusters, Wenzhou is incubating more than 200 science and technology enterprises, establishing the Municipal Artificial Intelligence Coordination and Dispatch Centre, and developing a series of industry-specific vertical large models. This year, innovation and technology have become frequent keywords in the Government Work Report presented at the Municipal Two Sessions.
In recent years, Wenzhou has remained committed to innovation-driven development and strengthening the city through industrial growth. The city has added the highest number of provincial-level new research and development institutions and provincial-level incubation platforms for science and technology enterprises in Zhejiang. The “Vali Shoe AI Design Platform,” hailed as the "Chinese GPT for footwear design", is a prime example of Wenzhou’s accelerated push to build an innovative city and cultivate a hub of high-quality productive forces.
At the large-model studio of Vali Shoe, a preview of a new shoe design appeared on the computer screen after staff selected shoe last types, materials, colours and patterns using the software. Compared to traditional intermediate-level designers, the Vali + design assistant model reduces the unit cost of drawings from RMB178 to just RMB0.48.
"While a well-trained designer can typically create about three shoe design sketches a day, they can produce up to 500 designs in a single day with the help of the Vali Platform.” According to Xiong WANG, CTO of Zhejiang Huilima Industrial Internet Co., Ltd., the Vali Shoe AI Design Platform is a professional large model based on hundreds of millions of pictures. The platform is capable of generating photo-quality design drafts with real-life material colour presentation in just ten seconds.
By leveraging AIGC technologies, designers can significantly enhance their design efficiency and creativity, while reducing the material and time wasted in sampling and reviewing. Additionally, these technologies enable material suppliers to quickly display the effects of their "last moulds" on finished shoes, supporting both sales and cooperation. It can be said that the Vali Shoe AI Design Platform harnesses artificial intelligence and other technologies to integrate the entire chain of products, planning, design, merchandising and retail, ultimately facilitating the transformation towards new business models that combine industry chains, supply chains and value chains.
Since its launch, the “Vali Shoe AI Design Platform” has developed an AI vertical large model for the footwear industry with 16 AI modules, and connected 38 smart factories in the industry with a pool of over 30,000 designers. It has secured over 500 paid corporate users and has become a case study in 39 educational institutions. At the same time, the “Huilima Shoe and Leather Industry Internet S2b2c Platform” has hosted more than 40,000 upstream and downstream enterprises in the industry, and facilitated about RMB2.3 billion in footwear transactions. The Huilima Shoe and Leather Digital Intelligence Industrial Park is home to various offline industry resources and more than 30 enterprises. It represents a new format of industrial community in Bei’an, the footwear capital of China.
In addition, Baoxiniao Garment’s Yunyi Intelligent Factory has developed an unmanned automatic cutting machine that can intelligently process customer data, enable tailored cutting, and facilitate personalised customisation on the production line. Kangnai Group’s database of shoe lasts has accumulated 3 million foot data records from people of different ages and sizes. Thanks to its intelligent foot-type measuring devices across 58 cities in China, the company can collect user data, which is then matched with the big data of shoe lasts, supporting personalised recommendations for the most suitable type.
Thanks to the support of AI and other technologies, many established enterprises in Wenzhou are transitioning from traditional businesses to technology-driven enterprises.
