This month we meet Alexis Khouri, he will tell us more about is professional journey and his vision of the 3D revolution.
Tell us about your background and how you got into the world of 3D?
I started at Allegorithmic in 2007, a French start-up specialized in 3D texturing. Early 2019, the company got acquired by Adobe, which I joined as well to become the Head of Sales and Business Strategy of their new 3D division.
What services do you offer, and how have you supported companies in this transition to the use of 3D?
Allegorithmic created an authoring software for 3D artist called Substance which has become the undisputed leader in 3D texturing for Entertainment and Product Design. We’ve been serving hundreds of thousands of users and customers including all major game developers, car manufacturers and consumer brands.
How do brands react when you talk to them about 3D and its benefits?
There has been a quiet revolution happening in the industry for the past few years with a transition from 2D to 3D as a replacement for traditional design and photography. When we are pitching to brands, there are no debates about the benefits of 3D (massive cost savings, massive increase in customer engagement). The question is not IF but HOW. What kind of tools should we use, what kind of people should we hire? Should we use a vendor? How much time does it take to ramp up? Etc..
What is your vision on the future of 3D in the e-commerce industry?
3D will be everywhere. Not only for real-time experience such as AR/VR, but also to replace all imagery that can be found on Websites or catalogues. Creating in 3D has many advantages upstream (productivity) and downstream (content velocity) and this will become a mandatory topic in every company that wants to optimize their customer journey. The 2020 pandemic has also accelerated this trend as remote work and fully virtual workflows has suddenly became the norm. It triggered countless strategic initiatives to modernize
e-commerce workflow, 3D being one of the key component for success.
Any advice for all e-commerce / BtoC businesses who would like to embark on the 3D adventure for their content creation?
There is a formidable opportunity to be ahead of the curve when it comes to innovation and productivity thanks to the new wave of 3D tools that have been developed in the past few years. Build a proof of concept, fine-tune the strategy according to analytics, hire the right talents to manage 3D projects and the outcome will be tremendously positive. It’s not rocket science (anymore) and there are tons of talents out there to help you with this task.