What does the future of fashion actually look like in the next 5–10 years?

David Schneider, co-founder of Zalando, sits down with industry expert Achim Berg for an unfiltered look at where fashion and e-commerce are heading — and what it will take to still be standing.

It comes down to those who understand the data, get smart about merchandising, and develop a testing and learning mentality. New brands and new players are already outcompeting others because they understand this much better. The question for everyone else is whether there is still time.

Schneider identifies a clear pattern in the brands and businesses that are already winning. They understand data. They read it well. They've become very smart on things that should be basic but aren't: when to put which product in which market at which time, how to merchandise, what product detail content actually works, what effect it has on return rates. And they test and learn constantly.

New players outcompeting established ones purely because they understand this better. The technology is there. There is plenty of it. The reason most companies haven't adapted is not that they couldn't — it's that they didn't really have to. They were still making enough money.

TikTok is trying to do business directly and avoid platforms. Is that a threat to a platform business like Zalando? An analyst would say yes. Schneider's answer is more interesting. The reason Zalando isn't worried is infrastructure. E-commerce needs a lot of it — logistics, software integration, merchandising across different channels, customer data, relationships with brands. TikTok can drive discovery, but the question is what happens next. Schneider's instinct is not to compete but to connect: how do we help brands connect there? How do we do the logistics, the software integration, the merchandising piece for brands that want to experiment on social?

Zalando evolved twice already. Zalando solved e-commerce in a desktop world. Then it solved it in a mobile world. Now, Schneider says, you have to solve it in an AI world. AI has already increased precision much more than before, and he expects it to increase further. Every gain in precision shows up immediately in customer experience and in efficiency. There is already a lot of momentum, but more is coming.

What solving it in an AI world looks like: Connecting deeper to LLMs. Connecting deeper to social media. And using new technology to increase precision in ways that directly translate into a better customer experience.

That framing matters because it explains how Zalando thinks about partnerships. Rather than asking what products brands want to sell, the question is: what capabilities do we invest in that brands cannot easily build themselves? The answer has always shaped how Zalando builds relationships — and it's the same logic being applied now to AI.