eCommerce

GenAI as a shopping assistant set to explode during Prime Day sales

A new report estimates that AI will be a larger-than-ever part of the online shopping process during Amazon’s Prime Day sale, which began Tuesday morning. Amazon’s annual sale, which this year spans four days (July 8-11), is predicted to drive $23.8 billion in online spending across U.S. e-commerce retailers, as other businesses run their own […]

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Remark raises $16M to build out human-powered expert models for e-commerce

Startups working on AI-powered e-commerce tools often rely on external data or user signals to build and improve their models. However, a company called Remark is taking a different approach by letting thousands of human experts chat with users while they are purchasing items, and then using that knowledge to train models. Remark also makes

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India’s GoKwik raised a small $13M round for a hefty leap in valuation

GoKwik, an Indian startup that offers a suite of integrated e-commerce products, has raised a small round of $13 million, which it calls a “growth” round, that has boosted its valuation to $450 million pre-money. While the new funding round, led by RTP Global, is 63% smaller than its Series B of $35 million, announced

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Amazon to spend over $4B to expand Prime delivery to rural communities in the US

Amazon announced on Tuesday that it is expanding its Same-Day and Next-Day delivery services to over 4,000 small cities and towns across rural U.S. This expansion will bring its fast Prime delivery service to millions of customers in places such as Asbury, Iowa; Fort Seneca, Ohio; Lewes, Delaware; North Padre Island, Texas; and Sharptown, Maryland.

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Chinese marketplace DHgate becomes a top US app as trade war intensifies

The Trump trade war has gone viral on TikTok, pushing a Chinese e-commerce app, DHgate, to the top of the Apple App Store in the U.S. After Trump increased U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports by 145%, numerous Chinese suppliers and manufacturers began making TikTok videos explaining to consumers how the global luxury goods market actually

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Cino cracks bill-splitting at the moment of payment, raises seed round

While Venmo or Splitwise are effectively ‘debt collector’ tools, which require one person to pay a full bill and then request funds from others, neither have cracked bill-splitting at the moment of payment. European startup Cino, which has come up with just such a product, has now raised €3.5m in a Seed funding round led

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eBay makes it easier to find fast-shipping items and local listings

eBay announced on Thursday that it has updated its platform to help buyers find fast-shipping items and local listings, thanks to changes to Search item cards and additional usage of AI. The company is making it easier to identify items with fast delivery, as search item cards now display delivery range estimates for all fast

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Shop Circle raises $60M to encircle ecommerce with an app suite

The boom in ecommerce post-pandemic meant shops moved online. However, some merchants ended up with dozens of separate app providers to accommodate everything from supply chains, inventory, and marketing. The founders of Shop Circle realized this and either built or bought many such apps. The company has now raised $60 million in a Series B

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Shopify pushes for ‘open trade’ as Trump delays import exemption

On the same day that President Donald Trump delayed ending a trade exemption targeting certain Chinese imports, ecommerce company Shopify published a blog post making its stance on U.S. trade policy clear. In the post, Shopify endorsed “open trade,” calling for regulators to give online merchants the “freedom to expand without constraints imposed by geopolitical

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