Lectra Releases New Insights On Removing Four Key Barriers To Sustainable Product Development In Fashion
April 2026 - As sustainability expectations rise across the fashion industry, Lectra has announced the publication of a new document aimed at helping brands reduce their environmental impact while remaining competitive.
The newly released insights detail how fashion brands can overcome the four main barriers to sustainable product development, providing the necessary data clarity to make better, environmentally conscious decisions.
Up to 94 per cent of a product’s environmental footprint is determined during the development phase, long before any manufacturing begins.
Despite this critical window of opportunity, many fashion brands continue to struggle with fragmented product information, limited material visibility, and unpredictable demand.
These obstacles inherently slow down production teams and make sustainable decision-making significantly more difficult to achieve.
Additionally, a lack of supply chain visibility remains a critical hurdle. Without purpose-built traceability solutions, teams are forced to manually collect data from scattered supplier tiers, depending on paper documents that are difficult to validate and prone to manipulation.
Furthermore, inaccurate demand forecasting inevitably leads to overproduction and waste.
When market insights are not integrated into creative workflows, teams lack visibility into style trends, pricing movements, and desirability signals, resulting in misaligned collections and increased carbon emissions.
Finally, the exclusion of eco-design in the early creative stages prevents designers from accessing vital Life Cycle Assessment tools.
This absence means critical sustainability insights are missed when making foundational material and sourcing decisions.
By supporting more responsible and eco-friendly collection development, Lectra empowers fashion brands to reduce waste and lower emissions, building a more sustainable future for the industry without compromising profitability.
About Lectra
At the forefront of innovation since its founding in 1973, Lectra provides industrial intelligence technology solutions—combining software in SaaS mode, cutting equipment, data, and associated services—to players in the fashion, automotive and furniture industries.
With boldness and passion, Lectra accelerates the transformation and success of its customers in a world in perpetual motion thanks to the key technologies of Industry 4.0: AI, big data, cloud and the Internet of Things.
The Group is present in more than one hundred countries. It operates three production sites for its cutting equipment, located in France, China and the United States.
The company offers innovative software, hardware, and services that facilitate digital transformation and sustainable practices.
