As the buzz around NFTs begins to stir up the fashion world, Hong Kong-based Richard Hobbs, a digital native in the business of fashion for more than three decades, has come up with a brand new fashtech vision for this industry. With a core team of five and a network of collaborators and designers around the world, he pivoted about two years back to launch bnv.me, apparently the first blockchain validated marketplace for NFTs in the apparel, footwear and accessory worlds. Hobbs talks to Richa Bansal as he dispels a lot of the confusion around it.
How would you make someone who has no knowledge of non-fungible token (NFT), cryptocurrency, cryptokitties etc understand what these newfangled terms mean?
I think the best way to describe an NFT is as proof of ownership for something which exists digitally. Until recently, this was not able to be proven but using blockchain technology allows this to take place. Once you have that proof of existence, which can also equate to proof of ownership, an NFT belongs to a person’s wallet and this allows for the items to be collected, traded, and eventually used in other areas of the web. In our case that’s about working with known brands to make beautiful products and giving the opportunity for consumers to shop for their virtual wardrobes and then collect, trade and eventually wear across digital environments. Same as you can now purchase skins to personalise your digital ID, you will be able to wear limited release branded products. I believe the high will be extremely similar. By keeping the virtual products on the blockchain and as an NFT, it guarantees the authenticity and scarcity of each product unlike in the real world where nobody really knows what “limited edition” actually represents. Having said that, some of our brands are looking to offer something physical as well, i.e. the top bidder can get a one off representation made to order or other incentives such as a discount code for in-store or on-line purchases.
Cryptocurrencies have found acceptance and usage among a population that is either well off or is extremely tech-savvy. So, do you see a new digital divide coming up? In the present scenario, this seems to have little chance of going mass.
We are at the very early stage of NFTs becoming a major part of the economic system within the digital realm. So yes, there are bound to be early stage divides because currently the people engaging in buying and trading of entities are an extremely small number. But I do believe that within 4–5 years large populations will be using one or more crypto wallets to purchase items online, and not just collectibles, but everyday consumables. There are so many developments going on towards increasing the accessibility as well as reducing the costs connected to distributed ledger technology (DLT), some are aware of and others that won’t be for a while, that the benefits of decentralized autonomous organisations (DAOs) will be much more widely accessible. You have to look past the noise around the price of Bitcoin and crazy NFT sales.
Sooner or later, governments are going to bring in more regulation for cryptocurrencies. How do you think the fashion industry is going to react to that? In what way?
It’s very difficult to predict what individual governments may or may not do when it comes to cryptocurrencies. My opinion is that they are here to stay, and that governments, regulatory authorities and businesses will find a way to engage with DLT and DAOs. The fashion industry, as well as every other business, should be looking at how they can embrace these technologies. I firmly believe that every fashion brand should have a digital collection as well as a physical one. There will be fashion brands in the very near future that only exist digitally. They will be extremely successful and very profitable.
Are NFTs a fad or here to stay?
NFTs are definitely not a fad. They will be here for a long, long time and will be one of the building blocks of metaverse life and transactions. Although the news and the noise at the moment has been about high valuations for single pieces of art, or even memes and tweets, the reality for the future is that NFTs will likely become the primary medium of digital transactions. It will affect not just fashion and art but music, books, events, conferences, concerts. Anything that can potentially take place online could be tokenised and have a value.
You mention metaverse life and transactions. Are human beings gradually on their way to robotisation-the 8-10 year olds as also zillennials rarely move about without their game, ear plugs and cell phone!
That’s not for me to comment on.
What is going to be the geographical spread of your BNV project? With the second wave of the pandemic bringing life to a halt in far too many countries, supply chains are bound to be severely affected. If a product doesn’t move, there can’t be a market.
Our business is digital; it’s on the internet. So, there are no real geographical restrictions unless they are imposed upon us by governments. There is no doubt that the world has changed in the last year and a half and some of those changes will affect the way we live our lives and conduct our business for a very long time. We will be living our lives online to an extent never experienced before and with the advances in technology and communication there will be opportunities for people to wear the items from their digital wardrobes in multiple environments and metaverses.
How mainstream is gaming-fashion going to be and how and where does BNV fit in?
We see it as a huge business. Estimates for last year were that up to $50 billion was spent in-game on wearables, skins and accessories. The vast majority of that was income for the gaming companies, not fashion brands. We intend to be the safe pair of hands that helps brands enter these worlds and see the rewards.
The entire viability of your Brand New Vision (BNV) hinges on cryptocurrencies. How much acceptance as well as usage of cryptocurrencies do you see in the near future? And how much of that would be in the digital fashion space?
There are experts and commentators out there who can give a much better idea of what the future of crypto will be, but from my perspective when we came up with the concept of BNV as an auction house and marketplace for digital fashion over two years ago it was obviously apparent that NFTs were the key to making it work for both brands, designers and 3D creatives as well as customers. We are completely changing the relationships between brands and consumers and at the same time also shaking up the economics of the “old” fashion world.
This article was first published in the June 2021 edition of the print magazine.
Published on: 10/06/2021
DISCLAIMER: All views and opinions expressed in this column are solely of the interviewee, and they do not reflect in any way the opinion of Fibre2Fashion.com.
