With this patent, Nike wants you design and manufacture your own shoes. You could soon be able to not only create your unique combination of color, texture and design but also watch your shoe being manufactured step by step. The technology presents libraries of different parts of the shoes such as uppers, soles etc. and their characteristics such as material used and color. Once a user selects different parts and their characteristics, the invention passes this information to a knitting machine to start the manufacturing process. During manufacturing, the physical layout and operation of knitting machine are displayed to the user so that the user can easily perceive the relationship between the availability of material, the physical limitations of knitting machine used to manufacture footwear upper, and the limitations on design choices in order to maintain the structural integrity of upper.
Patent Information
Publication number: US 20150366293A1
Patent Title: Footwear Designing Tool
Application number: US 14/747517
Publication date: 24 Dec 2015
Filing date: 23 Jun 2015
Inventors: Brad N. Clarkson
Original Assignee: Nike, Inc.
