Commerce

Retail, online shopping, e-commerce, and social commerce are a huge and ever-changing industry. Our commerce news covers everyone from Amazon, Shopify and Walmart to all the newest and hottest DTC brands, as well as influencers making the shift into selling products online.

Zepto, an Indian quick commerce startup, has more than doubled its valuation to $3.6 billion in a new funding round of $665 million.

Zepto, a 10-minute delivery app, raises $665M at $3.6B valuation

LTK (formerly LiketoKnow.it and RewardStyle), the influencer shopping app with 40 million monthly users, announced on Thursday the launch of a free direct message tool for creators to instantly share…

Influencer shopping app LTK gets an automatic direct message tool

Online shopping trends are expected to stay strong this year, but e-commerce is more fragmented than ever. With brands selling on so many platforms — from TikTok Shop, to established…

Daydream rakes in $50M seed funding to build an AI-powered search engine suited for e-commerce

Amazon is bringing its generative AI listing smarts to more sellers, revealing today that those in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the U.K. can now access tools designed to improve…

Amazon extends generative AI-powered product listings to Europe

Featured Article

Can quick commerce leapfrog e-commerce in India?

Even as quick commerce startups are retreating, consolidating or shutting down in many parts of the world, the model is showing encouraging signs in India. Consumers in urban cities are embracing the convenience of having groceries delivered to their doorstep in just 10 minutes. The companies making those deliveries —…

4 days ago
Can quick commerce leapfrog e-commerce in India?

Apple announced at last week’s WWDC 2024 that users would be able to access loans through third-party app Affirm through Apple Pay.

Apple kills Pay Later feature ahead of Affirm integration

Finaloop’s solution is a platform that uses automation in the background to track transactions covering three different functions in one.

From sperm freezing to accounting tools, Finaloop scores $35M to solve e-commerce retailers’ bookkeeping headaches

Care/of, a company offering personalized subscription vitamin packs, says it will be canceling all subscriptions as of Monday, June 17 and will no longer be accepting new orders. The news…

Subscription vitamin company Care/of is shutting down

RetailReady targets the $40 billion compliance market to help reduce the number of retail compliance losses that shippers incur annually due to incorrectly shipped packages.

YC grad RetailReady raises $3.3M for an AI warehouse app that hopes to save brands billions

The merger has yet to close due to extended due diligence amid ongoing restructuring and macroeconomic headwinds across multiple countries.

Sources: Wasoko-MaxAB e-commerce merger faces delays amid headwinds in Africa

Meta launched its Meta Verified program today along with other features, such as the ability to call large businesses and custom messages.

Meta rolls out Meta Verified for WhatsApp Business users in Brazil, India, Indonesia and Colombia

The British retailers association also takes aim at Amazon’s “Buy Box,” claiming that Amazon manipulated which retailers were selected for the coveted placement.

Amazon slammed with £1.1B data abuse lawsuit from UK retailers

True Fit, the AI-powered size-and-fit personalization tool, has offered its size recommendation solution to thousands of retailers for nearly 20 years. Now, the company is venturing into the generative AI…

True Fit leverages generative AI to help online shoppers find clothes that fit

Lance Riedel and Nigel Daley both spent decades in search discovery, but it was while working at Pinterest that they began trying to understand how to use search engines to…

How a couple of former Pinterest search experts caught Biz Stone’s attention

Commerce platform Shopify has acquired Checkout Blocks, allowing Shopify Plus merchants to make no-code customizations in their checkout to enhance customer experience and potentially boost sales.  Checkout Blocks, which debuted…

Shopify acquires Checkout Blocks, a checkout customization app

Temasek has previously invested in Lenskart, and this new funding follows a $500 million investment by the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority last year.

Temasek, Fidelity buy $200M stake in Lenskart at $5B valuation

Temu is to face Europe’s strictest rules after being designated as a “very large online platform” under the Digital Services Act (DSA).

Chinese e-commerce marketplace Temu faces stricter EU rules as a ‘very large online platform’

YoLa Fresh works with over a thousand retailers across Morocco and records up to $1 million in gross merchandise volume.

YoLa Fresh, a GrubMarket for Morocco, digs up $7M to connect farmers with food sellers

Pinterest announced today that it is evolving its Creator Inclusion Fund to now be called the Pinterest Inclusion Fund. Pinterest teamed up with Shopify’s Build Black and Build Native programs…

Pinterest expands its Creator Fund to allow founders

Featured Article

More neobanks are becoming mobile networks — and Nubank wants a piece of the action

Nubank is taking its first tentative steps into the mobile network realm, as the NYSE-traded Brazilian neobank rolls out an eSIM (embedded SIM) service for travelers. The service will give customers access to 10GB of free roaming internet in more than 40 countries without having to switch out their own…

2:00 am PDT • May 28, 2024
More neobanks are becoming mobile networks — and Nubank wants a piece of the action

India’s Adani Group is in discussions to venture into digital payments and e-commerce, according to a report.

Adani looks to battle Reliance, Walmart in India’s e-commerce, payments race, report says

Remark trains AI models on human product experts to create personas that can answer questions with the same style of their human counterparts.

Remark puts thousands of human product experts into AI form

The changes are designed to enhance the consumer experience of using Google Pay and make it a more competitive option against other payment methods.

Google Pay will now display card perks, BNPL options and more

A Singapore High Court has effectively approved Pine Labs’ request to shift its operations to India.

Pine Labs gets Singapore court approval to shift base to India

Expedia says Rathi Murthy and Sreenivas Rachamadugu, respectively its CTO and senior vice president of core services product & engineering, are no longer employed at the travel booking company. In…

Expedia says two execs dismissed after ‘violation of company policy’

Kudos uses AI to figure out consumer spending habits so it can then provide more personalized financial advice, like maximizing rewards and utilizing credit effectively.

Kudos lands $10M for an AI smart wallet that picks the best credit card for purchases

Poshmark, the social commerce site that lets people buy and sell new and used items to each other, launched a paid marketing tool on Thursday, giving sellers the ability to…

Poshmark’s ‘Promoted Closet’ tool lets sellers boost all their listings at once

Consumer protection groups around the European Union have filed coordinated complaints against Temu, accusing the Chinese-owned, ultra low-cost e-commerce platform of a raft of breaches related to the bloc’s Digital…

Temu accused of breaching EU’s DSA in bundle of consumer complaints

Restaurant365, which offers a restaurant management suite, has raised a hot $175M from ICONIQ Growth, KKR and L Catterton.

Restaurant365 orders in $175M at $1B+ valuation to supersize its food service software stack 

Uber Technologies announced Tuesday that it will buy the Taiwan unit of Delivery Hero’s Foodpanda for $950 million in cash. The deal is part of Uber Eats’ strategy to expand…

Uber to acquire Foodpanda’s Taiwan unit from Delivery Hero for $950M in cash