Alongside the dramatic growth in e-commerce, in part fueled by the pandemic, there’s also increased demand for services that can help merchants more easily participate online. A startup called Soona, now backed by an additional $35 million in Series B funding, has been tapping into this market with its platform that allows brands

Customer service tickets tend to fall into the same few buckets — returns, refunds or quality control questions. Not only are these repetitive, but it leaves little time for customer engagement on more complex requests, like relaying information on products or helping a customer find the best product for them.

Maja Schaefer and Matt Ciolek,

African e-commerce fulfilment startups backed by Y Combinator seem to be piquing investors’ interest this year for their niche e-commerce play.

Summer batch graduate ShipBlu is the latest on that list and confirmed to TechCrunch that it has raised $2.4 million in seed funding.

The company, founded by Ali Nasser, Ahmed ElKawass,

Warby Parker filing to IPO last week was one more sign that direct-to-consumer (DTC) is an extremely powerful e-commerce trend. But LA-based performance marketing agency MuteSix didn’t wait that long to build its business around scaling DTC brands.

Created in 2014 and acquired by Dentsu in 2019, MuteSix was recommended to TechCrunch by Rhoda Ullmann,

Facebook Inc.’s rebrand as Meta Platforms Inc. underscores how urgent it is for retailers and brands to build experiential e-commerce into their business strategies today in order to establish a distinctive presence in the metaverse tomorrow. 

Often described as the next generation of the internet, the metaverse is a connected, 3D virtual world where consumers,

Data privacy is top of mind for online sellers, and for good reason: Regulators in China, Europe and North America are taking an interest, and iOS 14.5 allowed many consumers to disable data tracking, with negative consequences for companies that relied on Facebook’s granular ad targeting.

Bearing those factors and others in mind, Ben Parr,

There is a lot of activity going on with social commerce in Nigeria. From Facebook-owned Instagram and WhatsApp holding the keys to the marketplace-facing side of things to fintech companies like Paystack and Flutterwave bringing value with their storefronts capabilities, small and medium-sized merchants have more reach to their customers than ever before.

Yet, the

As Facebook and Apple charge headlong into a more 3D future for the consumer web with big plans for mixed reality headsets, most web content out there is still firmly 2D. And while some are pushing for a completely separate “metaverse” where 3D content lives, that’s likely going to be a hard sell for existing

Fresh from its time in Y Combinator, SaaS startup Anakin raised $2 million to continue developing its software enabling e-commerce companies to see live pricing data on their competitors.

Mohit Prateek and Rashmi Bala started the company last September and officially launched in March to help e-commerce stores and brands increase their revenue using pricing,

Colombian e-commerce fulfillment startup Cubbo landed $4 million in seed funding as it launches operations in its home country this month after first going into Mexico earlier this year.

The company came together in January under the leadership of Brian York and Josu Gurtubay. York’s backstory is quite interesting. He was born on the streets

Walmart-backed Flipkart is acquiring online pharmacy startup SastaSundar to enter the healthcare segment in India as the e-commerce battle intensifies in the world’s second-largest internet market.

Flipkart said it has signed definitive agreements to acquire a majority stake in SastaSundar, but did not disclose the size of the deal. Eight-year-old SastaSundar was last valued

Indian commerce startup Udaan, which helps merchants secure inventory and working capital, has raised $250 million as it accelerates its scaling efforts and prepares to explore the public markets.

The Bengaluru-headquartered startup has raised $200 million via a convertible note and an additional $50 million as debt, its chief financial officer Aditya Pande told