Top 2022 resources on technology

Best technology resource in 2022.
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• 13 Augmented Reality Examples from Retailers, Brands - Augmented reality allows consumers to visualize the appearance of products on their bodies, in their homes, and more. Apple's ARKit has made the technology accessible.
  Topics: virtual, retailers, ar, reality, augmented, product, technology, shoppers, brands, app, users, examples, try.
• 2020 will change the way we look at robotics - Earlier this month, Hyundai acquired a controlling stake in Boston Dynamics that valued the company at $1.1 billion. What’s most interesting about the news isn’t the acquisition itself (it does, after all, find Boston Dynamics switching hands for the third time in seven years), but rather what the company’s evolution tells us about the state […]
  Topics: robotics, techcrunch, robot, videos, told, dynamics, change, look, way, company, viral, robots, boston, technology.
• 4 Things I Learned From My Ecommerce Business in the First Year - At the end of the day, online businesses are all about people.
  Topics: business, ecommerce, customers, clients, product, things, learned, client, technology, platform, industry, floral.
• 8 VR Startups to Keep an Eye On In 2021 - Did you know that the virtual and augmented reality global revenue is expected to grow from over $13 billion this year to more than $67 billion by 2024? In fact, virtual reality startups are valued at more than $36 billion on paper.
  Topics: virtual, vr, technology, reality, patients, eye, estate, real, startups, vrar.
• AI-driven audio cloning startup gives voice to Einstein chatbot - You’ll need to prick up your ears for this slice of deepfakery emerging from the wacky world of synthesized media: A digital version of Albert Einstein — with a synthesized voice that’s been (re)created using AI voice cloning technology drawing on audio recordings of the famous scientist’s actual voice. The startup behind the “uncanny valley” […]
  Topics: chatbot, techcrunch, audio, synthesized, technology, version, social, gives, startup, einstein, digital, ai, aidriven, voice, cloning.
• Affirm’s CTO talks transparency and the tech that makes BNPL possible - TechCrunch sat down with Libor Michalek, president of technology at Affirm, to understand just how the company differentiates itself from its plethora of competitors.
  Topics: possible, affirms, makes, talks, customer, techcrunch, transparency, bnpl, card, credit, pay, interest, technology, cto, affirm, tech, really, purchase.
• Allbirds flotation should help the market sort the value of tech-enabled IPOs - Allbirds gave us pricing information for its IPO this week, providing another window into the world of tech-enabled valuations.
  Topics: techcrunch, week, technology, value, help, flotation, techenabled, shares, company, ipo, sort, ipos, allbirds, valuations, market, price.
• Amazon Marketplace Sellers Are Attractive Acquisition Targets - Buyouts of Amazon marketplace sellers are booming. Aggregators are scooping up successful small sellers and creating large and lucrative portfolio companies. The acquisitions are mostly fueled by angel, venture capital, and private equity funding.
  Topics: company, attractive, amazon, acquisition, small, raised, sellers, aggregators, technology, targets, million, marketplace.
• Amazon expands its biometric-based Amazon One palm reader system to more retail stores - Last fall, Amazon introduced a new biometric device, Amazon One, that allowed customers to pay at Amazon Go stores using their palm. Today, the company says the device is being rolled out to additional Amazon stores in Seattle — an expansion that will make the system available across eight total Amazon physical retail stores, including […]
  Topics: data, stores, expands, biometricbased, customers, amazon, palm, customer, company, technology, techcrunch, retail, system, reader, seattle.
• Amazon expands its custom-fit clothing service ‘Made for You’ with athletic tees - Amazon is expanding its experimental custom clothing service, Made for You, which allows shoppers to create clothing designed for their exact body measurements. First launched in December 2020 with casual tees, the retailer is now adding athletic shirts that can be customized in close to 50 different ways by selecting from different fit options, necklines, […]
  Topics: clothing, tees, techcrunch, customers, data, measurements, fit, expands, service, athletic, body, technology, shoppers, customfit, amazon.
• Amazon is bringing its Amazon One palm scanner to select Whole Foods as a payment option - Amazon is bringing its new biometric device, the Amazon One scanner, to Whole Foods store. The retail giant this past fall introduced the Amazon One scanner, which allows shoppers to enter a store by having their palm scanned. The customer’s palm signature can be associated with their payment mechanism in a retail environment — like […]
  Topics: option, bringing, customers, select, scanner, technology, techcrunch, stores, amazon, palm, store, payment, seattle, device, foods, market.
• Amazon is opening a London hair salon to test AR and other retail technologies - Amazon announced this morning it’s opening Amazon Salon, the retailer’s first hair salon and a place where Amazon aims to test new technologies with the general public. The salon will occupy over 1,500 sq. ft on Brushfield Street in London’s Spitalfields, where Amazon says it will initially be trialing the use of augmented reality (AR) […]
  Topics: technologies, techcrunch, hair, customers, products, salon, opening, london, technology, ar, amazon, test, retail, data.
• Amazon's 3P effect and 7 other changes in people's consumption - These are the behaviors that are changing the way consumers buy products online and the expectations they now have of this channel.
  Topics: consumption, models, effect, changes, online, companies, 3p, technology, retail, support, transformation, peoples, consumers, amazons, consumer, offer.
• Amazon’s cashierless Just Walk Out technology comes to Houston Astros’ Major League Baseball Stadium - Amazon announced today it will bring its cashier-free checkout technology, Just Walk Out, to a Major League Baseball stadium for the first time. MLB team Houston Astros will introduce the Just Walk Out system to two stores at Minute Maid Park, allowing fans to purchase food and beverages. 19th Hole and Market, two food and […]
  Topics: walk, houston, stadium, comes, astros, cashierless, league, shopping, major, store, fans, baseball, techcrunch, amazon, stores, customers, technology.
• An Introduction to NFTs - Non-fungible tokens are a hot topic. Some claim that NFTs are the future of artwork — viable, profitable investments. Detractors wonder if NFTs are a short-term novelty. In this post, I'll describe NFTs and how they are created, purchased, and sold.
  Topics: created, nft, sold, technology, million, nfts, computer, introduction, demand, digital, blockchain.
• Announcing the 2021 BigCommerce Partner Awards Winners - At BigCommerce, we provide the platform for brands to build, innovate and grow their businesses. Additionally, when they need help…
  Topics: announcing, partners, experience, agency, solutions, technology, bigcommerce, winners, winner, partner, merchants, platform, awards, ecommerce.
• Attention! Kavak will hire 500 engineers to develop technology - Fernando Scasserra, former director of engineering at Mercado Libre, joins the company to lead this team of programmers.
  Topics: mexico, company, brazil, located, engineers, hire, technology, software, develop, kavak, development, team, attention.
• Bandit ML helps e-commerce businesses present the most effective offer to each shopper - Bandit ML aims to optimize and automate the process of presenting the right offer to the right customer. The startup was part of the summer 2020 class at accelerator Y Combinator . It also raised a $1.32 million seed round in September from YC, Haystack Fund, Webb Investment Network, Liquid 2 Ventures, Jigsaw Ventures, Basecamp Fund, […]
  Topics: present, effective, stores, startup, ecommerce, technology, software, techcrunch, ml, ventures, helps, offer, bandit, conti, uber, shopper, tools, businesses.
• Berlin Brands’ Exec on Ecommerce Acquisitions, Technology, More - Berlin Brands Group started on eBay 15 years ago. It is now a global ecommerce powerhouse, with over $300 million in annual revenue across a dozen or more brands. Managing Director Christian Salza addresses the company's acquisition process, its focus on technology, and more.
  Topics: exec, brand, products, technology, started, brands, ecommerce, different, amazon, million, berlin, im, product, acquisitions.
• Bike Retailer Solves a Pandemic-driven Problem - Lots of consumers wanted to get outside when the pandemic hit last year. Among the beneficiaries was Erik's Bike Shop, a Minnesota-based retailer, which experienced a massive increase in web traffic and customer service requests — phone calls, emails, and chats. The staff was overwhelmed.
  Topics: technology, shoppers, online, solves, pandemic, problem, eriks, team, information, customer, pandemicdriven, retailer, inventory, vtex, bike.
• BluePallet raises $5M to take its chemical industry marketplace global - BluePallet, an online marketplace connecting manufacturers with the chemical industry, announced today that it has raised $5 million in a funding round led by Vinmar Ventures, a subsidiary of petrochemical distributor Vinmar International.  The startup also announced today that it has become the first industrial commerce platform to “officially” operate on Alibaba.com. This means that […]
  Topics: barrows, global, network, 5m, techcrunch, transactions, technology, marketplace, today, chemical, raises, transaction, bluepallet, industry.
• Bolt makes first acquisition with Tipser, launches ‘Remote Checkout’ - The ability to purchase something at the point of discovery from digital content exists, but Bolt is ready to give that purchase its “one-click” treatment.
  Topics: million, tipser, company, sites, products, techcrunch, launches, bolt, acquisition, wagenheim, technology, checkout, remote, makes.
• Brazil’s Olist gets its horn with new $186M funding round - Olist said it tripled its size in 2021 and closed on four acquisitions within the last year.
  Topics: capital, horn, small, 186m, techcrunch, olist, funding, technology, series, round, gets, retailers, brazils, wellington, company, sachs.
• Cana Technology raises glass to new capital as it readies beverage printer for market - Cana focused on identifying the basic set of ingredients, basically deconstructing beverages to figure out what makes it taste like a certain drink.
  Topics: readies, capital, market, technology, way, cartridge, printer, cana, glass, water, beverages, drinks, device, beverage, raises, techcrunch.
• Cartona gets $4.5M pre-Series A to connect retailers with suppliers in Egypt - Today, Cartona is announcing that it has raised a $4.5 million pre-Series A funding round to connect retailers and manufacturers via an application. It’s looking to take a large piece in the budding e-commerce and retail play, where multiple startups in Egypt are pulling their weight including, Capiter, also a year-old startup we reported on […]
  Topics: warehouses, technology, company, egypt, techcrunch, 45m, preseries, suppliers, connect, retailers, model, companies, cartona, market, gets.
• Charts: Global Venture Capital Funding 2021 - Global venture capital funding more than doubled in 2021 to a whopping $621 billion. Financial technology companies received the most, followed by retail tech providers.
  Topics: investments, vc, regions, capital, venture, positivity, global, charts, q4, record, billion, technology, funding.
• Chord.co Founders: Future of DTC Platforms Is Headless - Henry Davis and Bryan Mahoney anticipated in 2018 an avalanche of direct-to-consumer companies that served smaller, niche audiences. Chord, a DTC-first ecommerce platform, is their answer to bringing sophisticated, "headless" technology to smaller firms. "We like to call Chord the first headless platform with a brain," Davis told me.
  Topics: platforms, founders, future, dtc, headless, platform, brands, going, content, technology, glossier, chord, thats, chordco, customer.
• Consumer goods software company Aforza bags $22M to open US headquarters - Built on Salesforce and Google Cloud platforms, consumer goods companies can use Aforza to digitally transform product distribution and customer engagement.
  Topics: company, bags, using, industry, round, 22m, headquarters, software, salesforce, techcrunch, technology, goods, aforza, dinardo, consumer, open.
• Daily Crunch: Asian and Hispanic e-grocer Weee! bags $425 million Series E - Hello friends and welcome to Daily Crunch, bringing you the most important startup, tech and venture capital news in a single package.
  Topics: asian, crunch, hispanic, russian, million, going, technology, market, startup, company, techcrunch, companies, weee, bags, egrocer, daily, ukraine, series.
• Deliverr bags another giant round as it works to move inventory closer to customers - E-commerce fulfillment is certainly having a moment.
  Topics: techcrunch, round, customers, ecommerce, billion, inventory, giant, abbott, global, closer, chain, fulfillment, bags, works, technology, deliverr, company, merchants.
• Despite limitations, 3D and AR are creating new realities in retail - “Within the next five years, I think we're going to see that having AR and 3D on your dot-com and beyond will be mandatory.”
  Topics: furniture, realities, customers, technology, retail, techcrunch, limitations, shopping, creating, room, youre, online, ar, products, 3d, despite.
• Early Adopters Take the Lead - Adopting technology early is a challenge every business may face at some point in their growth and development. However, technology is now moving so fast that what might have seemed risky in the past might today actually be the safer bet, to stay ahead of the curve and ahead of the competition.
  Topics: technologies, talent, adopting, commerce, adopters, lead, trends, website, technology, way, pwa, early.
• Ecommerce Acceleration Is the Future. Don't Get Left Behind. - The global ecommerce market is exploding, and 2022 is shaping up as the year of the accelerator.
  Topics: achieve, left, future, technology, traffic, dont, brands, right, accelerators, scale, acceleration, ecommerce, data.
• Ecommerce Product Releases: April 3, 2022 - This installment of "Ecommerce Product Releases," our twice-monthly rundown of new services that could help merchants, includes live streaming, next-day delivery, subscription payments, and more.
  Topics: returns, storefronts, releases, ecommerce, product, expansion, platform, merchants, shopping, marketplace, technology, receive.
• Ecommerce Product Releases: December 15, 2020 - Here is a list of product releases and updates for mid-December from companies that offer services to online merchants. There are updates on the return and dispute processes, fulfillment, personalization, contact center services, and merchant banking.
  Topics: merchants, help, platform, services, experience, capabilities, ecommerce, technology, announced, releases, product, customers.
• Ecommerce Product Releases: March 15, 2022 - Twice monthly we publish a rundown of new services, updates, and collaborations that could help merchants. This installment addresses social commerce, shipping, virtual fitting, more.
  Topics: product, video, launches, meta, merchants, releases, zeekit, technology, program, sellers, ecommerce.
• Elastic Path Payments Q&A with Harry Chemko - We are excited to announce Elastic Path Payments, powered by Stripe, a new addition to the Elastic Path product offering. As more and more digitally-driven brands embrace a Composable Commerce approach, we are thrilled to share that this announcement reduces the complexity of multi-vendor solutioning by pre-integrating payments. In addition, Elastic Path Payments empowers brands with best-in-class, feature-rich payments functionality to support complex checkout processes, across touchpoints. We sat down with Elastic Path co-founder & Chief Strategy Officer Harry Chemko to learn more about Elastic Path Payments. See what he had to say below. Q: What is Elastic Path Payments?  Q: Why Does This Matter for Digitally-Driven Brands? A: I think there are two key areas of impact that Elastic Path Payments will have on the how brands manage digital commerce. First, Elastic Path Payments gives brands access to the cutting-edge, API-first payments technology that they need to power seamless online checkout experiences. Features like fraud management, network-wide acceptance, support for global brands and best-in-class security ensure that brands meet customer expectations and hit growth targets. And, second, simplifying Composable Commerce. At Elastic Path we are seeing more and more interest for a Composable Commerce approach. While we are thrilled to see this momentum, we still hear that managing multiple vendors can feel complicated. To that end, we know that two-thirds of companies prefer a single payments solution over multiple best-of-breed vendors. By pre-integrating payments technology into Elastic Path, this offering eliminates the need to manage yet another vendor. Q: What Are the Benefits of Choosing Elastic Path Payments instead of Managing Payments Technology Separately from a Commerce Platform? A:  Beyond the integrated commerce and payments technology, and simplification of solution management that we just talked about, Elastic Path Payments puts customer success above all else. Unlike other Composable Commerce vendors that leave brands to manage a multi-vendor solution on their own, we focus on becoming a trusted partner in their Composable Commerce journey. One of the ways we emphasize this is with a dedicated customer success manager from Elastic Path who shares a deep knowledge of all facets of a business and can offer guidance, support, and advocate for a customer to technology partners.      From a functionality standpoint, Elastic Path Payments includes key features that enable brands to hit revenue goals. For example, automated retry logic and credential updates increase payment acceptance rates and, seamless online checkouts increase conversion rates. Q: How Does This Make it Easier for Brands to Embrace Composable Commerce?  Q: What Are the Current Trends in the Market on Payments Offerings? How Are These Addressed?  A: Two key trends that come to mind are: 1. Brands expanding into new multiple business models, geographies, and Alternate Payment Methods. In today’s world, it's crucial to give customers the payment options they would like to use, which can significantly increase conversion rates and average order values.  Interested in Learning More About Elastic Path Payments? Simplify Composable solutions with integrated, feature-rich payments technology that powers revenue-generating experiences across customer touchpoints & business models (B2C, B2B, B2B2C), all from a single commerce platform. Go to Elastic Path Payments 2. B2B2C brands, those that operate franchise or distribution models, looking to digitally transform.  With the addition of Elastic Path Payments, Elastic Path customers can manage all business models, geographies, and payments methods with built-in payments technology. In contrast, other commerce platforms often require multiple instances or different products with numerous integrations of payments solutions to operate each model and accommodate the complexity and specific needs of each one.   Q: You Mentioned a Few Features but Can You Tell us More About the Included Feature Set in Elastic Path Payments?  A:  Absolutely, I like to bucket the feature set into three groups that mirror the three significant stages of the checkout funnel. At the first stage of the funnel, you have features that support a seamless online checkout. This includes support for over 25 languages, 135 currencies, and the ability to dynamically show the payment methods most likely to improve conversion. Together these features can provide up to a 46% increase in sales after enabling local payment methods. To address the second stage of the checkout funnel, you have features related to fraud detection. Fraud detection is important to organizations as missed fraud can be very costly to brands. But, on the other hand, brands also don’t want to accidentally decline good transactions as we know this also leads to lost profits. In fact, every year businesses lose an estimated 3% of their revenue due to false declines. Since Stripe, the underlying technology of Elastic Path Payments,, has seen 90% of all the credit cards that are in use in the United States, if there is an issue with a particular credit card, there is a very good chance the network has seen it before and will accurately flag or not flag a transaction. This results in decreased false positives, increased checkout conversions, and a better customer experience overall. At the third stage of the checkout funnel you have features like network acceptance, which improves authorization rates, reliability and processing performance through a direct integration with card networks.  In addition, to features related to the three stages of the checkout funnel, Elastic Path Payments also provides best-in-class security and a centralized dashboard for real time reporting. Chat with us today to learn how your brand can benefit from Elastic Path Payments or learn more here.
  Topics: features, elastic, qa, technology, customer, chemko, harry, composable, checkout, path, commerce, brands, payments.
• Entrepreneurs Should Embrace Web 3.0 - This once-new technology initially made people nervous, but now virtually all businesses are reliant upon it, and it's set to become even more crucial to the way companies function.
  Topics: decentralized, entrepreneurs, embrace, blockchain, web, technology, supply, data, businesses, insurance, applications.
• European point of sale provider SumUp acquires customer loyalty startup Fivestars for $317M - SumUp, a European-based competitor to Square, PayPal/iZettle and others that provide mobile-powered card readers and other sales technology to merchants and small businesses, has made an acquisition in the U.S. to dig deeper into that market and to expand the kinds of services that it provides to customers globally. The company has acquired Fivestars, which […]
  Topics: small, startup, customer, technology, company, provider, fivestars, techcrunch, businesses, merchants, used, sumups, million, european, loyalty, sumup, sale, point.
• Even Small Companies Use AI, Machine Learning - Data, technology, and people are at hand to make artificial intelligence and machine learning available to all commerce companies. To be certain, artificial intelligence and its sub-field, machine learning, have gone through cycles of inflated expectations followed by disappointments.
  Topics: learning, translation, companies, problems, scientists, aiml, models, machine, ai, technology, solve, data, small.
• Everything You Need to Know About Marketing Operations in One Place - One of my favorite movies is "School of Rock," which also happens to be one of 2003's best films. In the movie, Jack Black poses as a substitute teacher at a private school, and, after noticing the students are musically talented, he turns the 10-year-olds into a fully-fledged rock band.
  Topics: strategy, teams, marketing, operations, know, team, technology, stakeholders, processes, place, ops, email, need.
• Fabric raises $200M at a $1B+ valuation for robotics-based fulfillment tech to help e-commerce players compete with Amazon - Amazon continues to be the 800-pound gorilla in the room for companies in the retail sector. Today, a startup called Fabric, which is building technology to help those other retailers — big and small — compete more squarely against that muscle specifically in fulfillment with robotics technology, “micro-fulfillment” centers and last-mile operations, is announcing $200 […]
  Topics: tech, fulfillment, centers, players, ecommerce, retail, opportunity, technology, roboticsbased, microfulfillment, operations, goren, valuation, raises, fabric, help, techcrunch.
• Fresh round of $355M lifts online checkout company Bolt into decacorn territory - This newest raise comes just three months after Bolt took in a sizable $393 million in Series D funding.
  Topics: company, lifts, decacorn, checkout, shoppers, territory, bolts, round, fresh, bolt, technology, network, online, breslow, series, funding, techcrunch.
• Full Harvest targets food waste by finding homes for imperfect, surplus produce - Within the past two years, Full Harvest’s impact on keeping food out of landfills grew five times, prompting the company to seek out additional capital to keep the momentum going.
  Topics: imperfect, finding, homes, million, technology, marketplace, techcrunch, produce, waste, company, targets, food, moseley, harvest, capital, sustainable, surplus.
• Glossier just laid off one-third of its corporate employees, mostly in tech - Glossier, the popular beauty brand led by former blogger Emily Weiss, let go of 80 of its corporate employees today, according to an internal email obtained by Modern Retail. The cuts, which amount to around one-third of Glossier’s corporate workforce, will primarily impact the company’s technology team. “[W]e are shifting our technology strategy to leverage […]
  Topics: glossier, onethird, employees, glossiers, corporate, retail, tech, weiss, company, technology, laid, email, techcrunch, companys.
• HDS, from the Borders and Webvan founder, raises $3M as it gears up to launch its robot-run grocery and general merchandise play - The online grocery market is poised to get a little more crowded in the next several months, with the launch of a startup led by a veteran founder who has taken big hits from Amazon in the past, but now hopes to come back swinging with the help of an army of robots. Home Delivery […]
  Topics: techcrunch, borders, grocery, system, million, robotrun, hds, online, technology, idea, raises, amazon, build, launch, general, webvan, merchandise, play.
• How COVID-19 Changed the Way We Think About Office Technology [New Research] - The recent COVID-19 pandemic has changed how we think about a lot of things.
  Topics: office, teams, reported, research, way, changed, marketing, covid19, inhouse, respondents, think, tools, technology, majority, pandemic, work.
• How Much Does It Cost to Implement Elastic Path? - When I, like many others, make an important purchase, especially one that involves a long-term commitment and represents a high percentage of my budget, I am thorough. Whether investing in a car, house, phone, or expensive new winter coat –I do my research. Usually that includes reading reviews, talking to friends and experts, and understanding the financial commitment –the price! The experience of technology buyers mirrors my approach.  At Elastic Path 100% of our prospective customers ask about price. In fact, when I poll our business development team it is the top question they receive on their introductory calls with brands. It comes up constantly, and for good reason! Investing in new eCommerce technology is a big deal for buyers both in terms of their companies’ ability to hit revenue targets in coming years and their own professional growth. Nobody wants to be the VP of eCommerce or CTO who advocated for a costly eCommerce platform only to have it fail. Unfortunately, most enterprise commerce vendors don’t share their pricing until you take several meetings with them. This process can feel dated and be extremely frustrating for brands who just want to understand if they can afford the investment or not. But, to play devil’s advocate, it’s often very hard for vendors to provide pricing without knowing a brands unique goals and requirements. That is exactly why I am writing this blog post. Although I can’t give you an exact number, this post will help you better understand how much it costs to implement Elastic Path and what you need to consider when thinking about the total investment and why traditional means of evaluation might need a rethink for modern approaches. I will cover: • An introduction to commerce technology pricing • The different components that will make up your total cost when working with Elastic Path • How each component is priced   Commerce Software Pricing 101: It Depends! “It depends”. That is the simplest (and most frustrating) way to answer the question “How much does it cost?”. A useful analogy that helps to explain this is making dinner.  How much will it cost to make dinner? The investment to put a meal on the table depends on the outcome you seek If you want something simple and don’t care about nutrition or flavor profile–a cup of ramen or a bologna sandwich are low-cost ways to make a meal. Did you make dinner? Yes. Was it less than $5? Yes. Was it ready in 3 minutes?  Yes. However, let’s say you want something a bit more nutritious and delicious made with all local ingredients –you’ll need grass-fed beef, farmer’s market vegetables, handmade pasta and cheese from your local Italian market, and bread from the neighbourhood bakery. Did you make dinner? Yes. Was it less than $5? No, it cost you $50 or more but it was delicious and supported your local community. It also look more time to shop and prepare than the bologna.  In these two scenarios both chefs put a meal on the table, but their goals were completely different meaning their cost was as well. Commerce is the same. The cost of your commerce solution will depend on your goals and requirements. If you want to commerce-enable a simple, existing site your cost will be much lower that if you want to re-platform multiple brands, across numerous geographies. So, when a representative from a commerce vendor tells you that pricing will depend. They are being honest and just need to understand your business and goals a bit more before they provide a detailed answer that's not higher than it needs to be, and more importantly isn't lower than it should be.  There is nothing worse than thinking you're getting a great deal only to find out later in the process that something will really be 5x what you were originally told. If a sales rep is able to give you a cost without understanding anything about your enterprise business-proceed with caution. These solutions are often geared more towards small businesses and can’t meet the needs of enterprises. The remainder of this blog will serve as a guide for anticipating the cost to implement your commerce solution with Elastic Path. What Are the Various Parts That Make Up My Commerce Investment? At Elastic Path we follow a Composable Commerce approach and so do our customers. Composable Commerce is an approach that enables business and tech teams to bring their brands' unique digital visions to life by launching and continuously optimizing digital commerce experiences from multiple best-of-breed vendors composed together into a complete, business ready solution. This means that when you implement Elastic Path, you will be connecting it with other technologies. Some brands may already have licenses for these third-party technologies while others may have to invest in them. For this reason your cost to implement is made up of 3 components:   1. Elastic Path Subscription including core commerce capabilities and APIs, business & developer tooling, education, & quick starts, and reference experiences. 2. Third party technology licenses for applications such as search, OMS, CMS, personalization, etc. 3. Implementation for those who plan to pay Elastic Path or a third-party SI to perform migrations, discovery, integrations, and design work.   Keep reading to better understand what each component will cost.   Elastic Path Subscription Pricing Elastic Path Commerce Cloud is a composable, API-first Headless Commerce microservices-based product for digitally driven branded manufacturers. It includes: • Core commerce capabilities & APIs • Business user tooling via our Commerce Manager dashboard • Developer tooling including a Postman collection, data model extensions, and more • Education and quick starts to accelerate user learning • Reference experiences for frontend best practices It is priced based on transaction volume, either GMV or orders processed. Typically, pricing starts around $50,000 USD/year and increases based on your transaction volume. As your transaction volume increases so will your total cost, but economies of scale mean your unit cost/ per transaction fees are much lower at $10 billion than they are at $10 million. Third Party Technology Pricing As described above, Elastic Path follows a Composable Commerce approach. This approach enables brands to choose their preferred third-party technology providers and seamlessly integrate them with Elastic Path. Instead of being locked in with a monolithic platform that does “all things” in an average capacity, Composable Commerce enables brands to choose the specific providers that will best fulfill their unique needs. This is one reason why brands prefer a Composable Commerce approach. Common applications that brands connect to Elastic Path include content management systems (CMS), storefront, enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools, order management systems (OMS), search, personalization, tax & payments, and PIM. Often, we find that brands simultaneously evaluate commerce and other third-party technology providers as the same time. Each of these applications will have their own price that is provided by your chosen vendor during the evaluation process. What you choose to invest in will depend on your backend requirements and the customer experiences you want to power. But, most often we talk to prospects who are also evaluating headless CMS and search technology. If you aren’t sure what you need an experienced solutions engineer or architect at your commerce platform can help you walk through this. If you’re not sure who that person is-reach out to the Elastic Path team. We have experienced commerce professionals who can walk you through this exercise.   Reduce your TCO See how Elastic Path reduces your eCommerce platform's Total Cost of Ownership with our guide. Check out the Guide On the other hand, some brands have already invested in these technologies so third-party license costs will not be added to implementation costs since they are already in place. If this is you, remember to consider the cost to connect your existing technology investments with a new commerce solution. See the implementation section below to learn more about integration cost. I may sound like a broken record at this point but, in summary, the cost of third-party technology just depends! Your cost will be impacted by what you choose to invest in now (versus in a year or never) and what you already have as part of your existing technology stack (and therefore don’t need to pay for).  With Composable Commerce you are given the complete control to define how quickly (or slowly) you want to scale your commerce strategy.  This is completely unique to every brand and every implementation. Depending on what you choose to invest in your cost will differ. Implementation Pricing The final element of pricing to consider is your implementation cost. The first step here is to determine what implementation work needs to be done. This completely depends on your unique project requirements but we commonly see implementation work fall into the following buckets: Migrate Your Data: This isn’t common for commerce implementations as data often lives in your third-party applications, but it is still something to consider. To determine if you need to complete this work, ask yourself: • Is there any data migration that needs to occur as part of implementation? If yes, you’ll need to think about data migration as part of implementation. Even if you don't plan to migrate product or customer data- it's often easier to simply re-build from your product system-of-record- you will need to plan for any in-flight or unfulfilled orders or orders within their return windows to ensure proper processing and handling of refunds or exchanges.  Align On Priorities & Scope: A discovery workshop is a key step in a successful implementation. This type of work ensures that your entire team is aligned on what you plan to build now and how your backlog is prioritized so that you reduce overall cost and time spent on getting live. Ask yourself: • Is my entire team aligned on what we need to do now versus in 1 year? • Does everyone have the same expectations about go-live? • Are we aligned on the timeline? (3 months, 6 months, 1 year) • Do all stakeholders agree with an iterative approach? If not, how can I change that? If you answered no to any of these questions, I would suggest investing in a discovery workshop where you nail down top priorities for go live and align on backlog prioritization so that you can start generating revenue sooner rather than later. Design Your Experiences: Design work can often be the most time-consuming and unpredictable part of any implementation as there are usually many prototypes and versions of a user experience to review. You can save time and money by leveraging templates provided by your SI or eCommerce solution but, we find that most brands want to customize a solution to make it their own. Design work includes alignment on the user experience, graphics, fonts, colors, themes, etc. and then subsequent A/B testing. Ask yourself: • Does the team plan to use templates or custom build the user experiences? • Who are the key players that need to be involved in providing input and review prototypes? • Does everyone have the same expectations about go-live? • Do all stakeholders agree with an iterative approach? If not, how can I change that? • Do you have an existing user experience you plan to use? • How will we measure and continuously improve our experience once live? If the answers to these questions are no or unknown, you will need to invest in design work. Decide on Implementation Strategy: Depending on cost, scope, and time parameters, every implementation is different.  It's important to align on your approach for implementation.  Ask yourself: • Will you built it all new (greenfield) and launch at once? • Will you increment capabilities, delivering the next highest priority first, then the next, then the next - building, learning, and iterating as you go? • Will you modernize your existing technology with an incremental (strangler) approach? Your implementation strategy will directly impact your short term and long term cost so it is crucial to ensure your business and tech teams are aligned on expectations.  Bring It To Life: When launching with a new eCommerce solution for an enterprise business there will always be some build work needed to get live. This includes integrating with third party technologies and building the customizations to meet your unique needs. Since Elastic Path is microservices-based, the build process can be completely modular. Separate team members can work on integrations with OMS, ERP, search, personalization, etc. all at the same time without disturbing each other. While you will still need to devote time to the build process, you will have less idle resources and a lower opportunity cost (the cost of doing nothing) when using Elastic Path. Once you understand the different aspects of implementations, the second step is to determine who will complete that work. You have a few options: • An SI partner or digital agency  • Elastic Path Success Assurance team • Your internal team • A mix of all three In general, you may save money when you use only your internal team. However, this approach is uncommon outside organizations with highly experienced technical team or a small project. We find that most brands use an SI or mix SI team members with their internal team to complete an implementation. If working with an SI or the Elastic Path Success Assurance team the more time (hours) you need, the higher the cost. Once you understand the work you need to complete and how you will do it, you can work with an SI or Elastic Path to understand total implementation cost. Based on what we see with customers, implementations can be anywhere from 1-4x your technology license cost depending on the scale of your project. Summary: If you’ve made it to the end of this post, you will understand that the cost of software is like the cost of making a meal –it just depends what you want! Our sales team at Elastic Path is well versed in providing pricing for brands with all different types of requirements and goals. Reach out today to receive a personalized estimate for your commerce implementation.
  Topics: cost, commerce, need, team, technology, implement, brands, work, path, elastic, implementation, does.
• How to Build a Marketing Technology (Martech) Stack That'll Grow With You - What will your marketing team look like six months from now? Or a year from now? How many people will you add? What new tools, systems, and data will you need? There are a lot of potential questions you can ask about the future of your business, but there is one certainty: you'll deal with more data, more people, more processes, and more complex problems as you grow.
  Topics: thatll, build, technology, martech, data, marketing, tech, need, team, tools, grow, stack, website, tool.
• IDC Technology Spotlight Highlights BigCommerce and Acumatica Partnership - As customer expectations rise around the entire shopping experience, from discovery to delivery, the competition has also closed in, making…
  Topics: b2c, spotlight, highlights, acumatica, systems, erp, organizations, partnership, legacy, technology, b2b, bigcommerce, idc, digital, commerce.
• Instacart acquires Caper AI, a smart cart and instant checkout startup, for $350M, as it moves deeper into physical retail tech - Instacart made its name by providing a way for consumers to bypass shopping in stores in person, by ordering items online and getting them delivered to their homes — a business that positively boomed in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. But with physical stores still looming large in the world of groceries, Instacart also […]
  Topics: instacart, caper, deeper, stores, physical, techcrunch, technology, smart, retail, tech, startup, items, moves, retailers, instant, company, business.
• Investment Robust in Retail, Ecommerce Technology - The pandemic has posed obstacles for both brick-and-mortar and online merchants. Among the challenges are labor shortages, inventory problems, delivery conundrums, and the need for more personalization. New providers are addressing those needs, and venture capitalists and other investors are eager to fund them.
  Topics: merchants, million, platform, investment, raised, online, technology, ecommerce, billion, delivery, funding, retail, robust.
• Latin e-commerce startup Merama raises $ 225 million - SoftBank led an initial close of about $ 150 million and Advent led a subsequent close, bringing the total raised to $ 225 million.
  Topics: raises, startup, million, merama, technology, brands, america, softbank, companies, ecommerce, capital, latin.
• Launching a Wearable Technology Through Accelerator Program - Aneela Idnani Kumar experienced subconscious hair pulling for more than 20 years, after one severe session Aneela’s husband, Sameer saw Aneela without her eyebrows. From that moment on, the life and business partners decided to find a way to help Aneela out of this trance-like behavior. In this episode of Shopify Masters, we chat with Aneela about her business journey of launching HabitAware to create wearable technology that can help the 1 in 20 Americans who live with hair pulling, skin picking, and nail-biting.More
  Topics: things, thats, wearable, product, youre, work, launching, technology, going, accelerator, program, really, help, know.
• Leveraging SMS to Build a Subscription Business - Chuckie Gregory is the founder of Club EarlyBird, a morning cocktail that makes it easy to wake up early and get stuff done. He has grown his supplement brand from $0 to $1-million in sales in less than a year through video testimonials, direct mail after purchase, and SMS messaging strategies.   In this episode, […]
  Topics: messaging, marketing, subscription, club, chuckie, testimonials, technology, morning, business, build, earlybird, leveraging, video, sms.
• Make It Big Podcast: The Gen Z Effect on Culture and Commerce with Hana Ben-Shabat - Welcome to The Make it Big Podcast, a bi-weekly audio series about all things ecommerce by BigCommerce. Gen Z’s impact on commerce and…
  Topics: gen, big, podcast, hana, culture, generation, effect, way, brand, benshabat, brands, technology, think, z, experience, going, commerce.
• MaxAB, the Egyptian B2B food and grocery delivery startup, raises $40M for expansion - Globally, food and grocery delivery startups have been raising mega-rounds of late, especially those in Europe as the pandemic has given rise to more people ordering online more than ever. This growth has translated to an increase in volume across e-commerce platforms all over the world. While there has relatively been no action in Africa […]
  Topics: africa, b2b, round, middle, startup, grocery, technology, company, merchants, food, supply, raises, maxab, delivery, expansion, egyptian, growth, elmegharbel, techcrunch.
• Muni gives Latin American communities buying power through shopping app - Community leaders centralize the orders, suppliers drop off the orders with Muni, which picks and packs them for the community leaders to manage the last-mile delivery and collect payments.
  Topics: gomez, communities, gives, muni, venture, technology, techcrunch, american, latin, community, online, buying, funding, app, leaders, company, power, shopping.
• New capital positions luxury goods reseller Rebag for next round of innovation - The company has since seen a trend of owning fewer items, but of those that are purchased, they are of higher quality, made better, longer lasting and retain some resale value.
  Topics: capital, goods, reseller, resale, market, techcrunch, items, positions, technology, round, luxury, innovation, million, gorra, rebag, company.
• Next-day package delivery startup Veho valued at $1B following $125M Series A - Veho's technology matches package delivery demand with qualified driver partners and lets customers know the actual time of delivery and even communicates when the driver is headed their way.
  Topics: delivery, techcrunch, technology, ecommerce, customers, nextday, valued, veho, 1b, package, series, zur, grow, following, startup, company, experience.
• Omnichannel, a key element for the future of commerce in Mexico - If you are a business owner and looking to increase your sales during this pandemic, this interests you.
  Topics: key, future, business, payment, different, commerce, omnichannel, physical, digital, element, technology, online, sales, businesses, mexico.
• Orderchamp raises 16.5 million euros - Dutch wholesale platform Orderchamp has raised 16.5 million euros for further expansion in Europe. The Series A-round was led by venture capital firm Prime Ventures, while existing investors henQ and several business angels also participated. The fresh funding follows only two years after Orderchamp’s inception in September 2019. The b2b… Continue reading
  Topics: way, euros, orderchamp, million, retailers, technology, raises, prime, sales, wholesale, unique, store, ventures.
• Oxbotica raises $13.8M from Ocado to build autonomous vehicle tech for the online grocer’s logistics network - Ocado, the U.K. online grocer that has been making strides reselling its technology to other grocery companies to help them build and run their own online ordering and delivery operations, is making an investment today into what it believes will be the next chapter of how that business will grow: it is taking a £10 […]
  Topics: companies, vehicle, techcrunch, logistics, delivery, work, million, autonomous, ocado, technology, tech, grocers, grocery, online, raises, oxbotica, network.
• Pandas wants to give Latin American businesses buying power in Asia - Pandas connects Latin America's small businesses directly with Asian manufacturers to reduce logistical problems and high fees often imposed by importers and intermediaries.
  Topics: capital, china, wants, buying, xin, pandas, techcrunch, america, ventures, technology, latin, preseed, power, american, asia, businesses.
• Papier inks $50M Series C to in a run to lead the online stationery market - Papier, a startup leveraging technology to bring very non-tech products into the world, has raised some funding to continue expanding its business on the heels of strong demand for its personalized notebooks, planners, cards and other paper-based stationery that it sells online. The London startup has raised $50 million, a Series C that it will […]
  Topics: brand, atighetchi, papier, online, technology, digital, today, way, series, stationery, run, products, startup, consumers, techcrunch, inks, market, c, lead.
• Pepper brings in $16M, gets back to its roots of spicing up ordering experience for food distributors - The ordering system is specifically designed so food distributors can launch mobile apps and websites to accept orders and payments online.
  Topics: food, industry, company, ordering, brings, cheung, distributors, technology, ventures, pepper, customers, roots, gets, techcrunch, restaurants, spicing, experience.
• Same-day delivery apps need more than speed to survive post-pandemic - Consumer satisfaction hinges on more than the amount of time it takes to move an order from an app to the customer’s door.
  Topics: speed, order, customers, technology, postpandemic, sameday, model, delivery, apps, customer, services, survive, techcrunch, need, app, business.
• Shipium gives e-commerce retailers Amazon-like supply chain tech - E-commerce retailers of all sizes can have that supply chain coordination layer that enables them to provide fast and cheaper shipping, too.
  Topics: shipping, amazonlike, tech, supply, ecommerce, shipium, technology, chain, gives, company, retailers, techcrunch, million.
• Silq spins its technology into visibility for apparel manufacturing - The company's approach is to bring visibility and real-time data from the manufacturing floor to brands so that brands can source, make and ship apparel.
  Topics: quality, silq, supply, techcrunch, spins, technology, apparel, company, radhakrishnan, chain, manufacturing, infrastructure, ventures, data, visibility.
• Silverflow nabs $17M for its updated, cloud-based take on payments processing technology - When it comes to online payments, the front end of the system has seen a massive amount of disruption in the last several years, with companies like Stripe, Adyen, PayPal, Square and others building APIs that make it very simple for online merchants to integrate easy payment services into their checkout flows. But when it comes […]
  Topics: cloudbased, providers, data, updated, payments, services, technology, legacy, silverflow, techcrunch, systems, nabs, 17m, processing, payment, transactions, vries.
• Snap further invests in AR Shopping with dedicated in-app feature, new tools for retailers - At Snap’s Partner Summit on Thursday, the Snapchat maker announced a number of new initiatives focused on using its AR technology to aid with online shopping. Most notably, the company is introducing a new in-app destination within Snapchat called “Dress Up” that will feature AR fashion and virtual try-on experiences, and it’s launching tools that […]
  Topics: snapchat, techcrunch, shopping, tryon, invests, inapp, fashion, tools, retailers, feature, snaps, users, dedicated, lenses, snap, ar, technology.
• Soft-hand Robots Are Coming to Ecommerce - For decades, manufacturing and industrial warehouses have used "hard" robots. They handle repetitive tasks and heavy lifting. But “soft” robots are much more sophisticated. They can safely grasp perishable and fragile items such as eggs, fruit, and bottles. Soft robots could transform fulfillment in many ecommerce warehouses.
  Topics: robot, ecommerce, distribution, items, centers, jobs, softhand, tasks, soft, robots, coming, robotics, technology.
• Stonehenge Technology Labs bags $2M, gives CPG companies one-touch access to metrics - Stonehenge Technology Labs wants consumer packaged goods companies to gain meaningful use from all of the data they collect.
  Topics: bowman, data, techcrunch, company, metrics, labs, stopwatch, onetouch, companies, stonehenge, bags, cpg, team, right, ventures, gives, technology.
• Stripe acquires Bouncer, will integrate its card authentication into the Radar fraud detection tool - On the heels of a $600 million fundraise earlier this year, payments giant Stripe has been on an acquisition march to continue building out its business. In the latest development, the company has acquired Bouncer, a startup based in Oakland that has built a platform to automatically run card authentications and detect fraud in card-based […]
  Topics: authentication, radar, tool, transaction, fraud, tools, bouncer, technology, verification, stripe, techcrunch, transactions, card, integrate, detection.
• Swiftly quickly gets brick-and-mortar stores set up to cater to online customers - Swiftly provides the technology tools that democratize the technology lead, enjoyed by Amazon and Walmart, to the rest of the industry.
  Topics: customers, cater, techcrunch, store, brickandmortar, set, gets, online, swiftly, million, quickly, retailers, digital, kim, grocery, ecommerce, technology, company, stores.
• Taste intelligence startup Halla closes $4.5M Series A1 to predict which grocery items shoppers will buy - Halla wants to answer the question of how people decide what to eat and now has $4.5 million in fresh Series A1 capital from Food Retail Ventures to do it.
  Topics: taste, shoppers, grocery, hallas, food, way, stores, retail, startup, technology, items, techcrunch, halla, product, intelligence, series, price, predict.
• Tata to open up super app Neu to outside brands - Tata Group plans to expand the family of services it offers on its recently launched Tata Neu super app to include services from outside the Indian conglomerate group, the company’s top executive said, as the 154-year-old salt-to-software giant looks to make a dent in the consumer technology space. Tata Neu — which clubs together nearly […]
  Topics: group, super, open, brands, offerings, neu, outside, technology, firm, tata, services, launched, techcrunch, app.
• TechCrunch+ roundup: VC ‘bottom feeders,’ valuation calculator, think like an investor - Farmers don't get embarrassed when the price of corn drops; similarly, there's no reason for startup founders to lose their joy because publicly traded tech stocks are undercutting their valuations.
  Topics: feeders, vc, think, startup, technology, valuation, writes, roundup, investors, war, techcrunch, tech, calculator, sonalker, investor, founders, valuations, post.
• The Benefits of an Ecommerce Technology Advocate - Managing an ecommerce technology stack is complicated. Many companies could use help. "As the marketplace for ecommerce [software] starts to broaden and becomes more complex, adding platforms and apps [can be] really hard," said Mark Wexler, a founder and partner at Whirlwind Ecommerce.
  Topics: software, help, requirements, wexler, benefits, platforms, technology, advocate, website, ecommerce, save.
• The Intersection of Ecommerce and NFTs: How NFT Technology is Changing DeFi - DeFi and fintech startups are putting financial tools in the hands of the average person. NFT technology takes this a step further by offering programmable data and trustless transparency.
  Topics: blockchain, changing, items, intersection, world, assets, platform, ecommerce, nfts, need, defi, nft, technology, users.
• The SPAC boom isn’t just here to stay, it’s changing consumer tech - The SPAC route is a match made in heaven for consumer tech companies: SPACs put more of a focus on the management team and the vision than traditional IPOs, which is a boon for such firms.
  Topics: spacs, traditional, changing, isnt, consumer, public, stay, tech, companies, techcrunch, spac, investors, company, boom, technology, market.
• Topsort, an auction-based advertising startup, now valued at $110M after seed round - When Regina Ye was in college, she was a Shopify seller and recalls being so fed up with advertising solutions that she spent finals week staying up late to figure out how ads worked on Facebook and Amazon. “It was super complicated,” she told TechCrunch. “I was an early adopter of B2B marketplaces, but advertising […]
  Topics: startup, auctionbased, ads, customers, round, valued, company, user, ye, topsort, technology, early, seed, advertising, marketplaces, techcrunch, 110m.
• Transforming Digital Experience with Composable Commerce and Co-Innovation - Companies today compete and win through their digital experience. At Bounteous, we focus our efforts on co-innovation and transformative digital experiences to drive results for our clients. We elevate brand experiences through our technology partnerships and unparalleled platform expertise. Elastic Path’s API-first enterprise commerce platform, ability to support complex business models, and open-source technologies provide the ability to create immersive experiences throughout all stages of a customer’s journey. Together we combine our content and commerce expertise to deliver commerce experiences that drive greater ROI. Are you looking for an edge in digital experience? This post will break down how your business can stay innovative and ahead of the curve in the current digital landscape, important factors your business must consider at the start of a digital transformation project and current trends in digital experience that are critical to future success, including insight around Composable and Customer-Centric Architecture. Innovation in the Current Digital Landscape At Bounteous, we exist to help leading companies compete and win digitally by continuously innovating brand experiences that drive transformative results. We believe that innovation begins with a critical insight and that a competitive advantage is attained when a brand can continuously generate and apply those insights. Simply stated, innovation is doing better things and doing things better. Therefore, insights need to be generated for various purposes - to help organizations define their thesis for transformation, create distinct brand experiences, expand and identify customer segments, flawlessly execute to drive conversion, and so much more. We achieve this through our model of co-innovation which is not a project or standalone initiative; it is fundamentally about enhancing the way we work together with our clients to deliver results. We believe that companies today compete and win through their digital experience - and how that digital experience connects to all other aspects of their ecosystem. While that’s been true for a while, we’ve seen it accelerate these last two years as companies need to connect with their customers more and more - and as 1:1 relationships with customers become the norm. Keith Schwartz, Co-Founder & CEO of Bounteous, has introduced the Co-Innovation Manifesto, which includes principles and a call-to-action for business executives seeking to compete and win digitally. We highly recommend you check it out! What to Consider at the Start of a Digital Transformation Project First and foremost, we believe in the power of ‘critical insights’ to inform strategies and experiences we create. We generate critical insights to develop end-to-end strategies that yield the most valuable opportunities for experience and commerce innovation. Innovation is accelerated by a virtuous cycle we call ‘digital flow,’ in which data yields critical insights that enable multi-moment orchestration and continuous experience and commerce innovation. We believe in always having a measurement strategy in place with the right tracking to ensure we can continue to learn from and evolve the digital experience – making it work harder and smarter for you. Lastly, when we talk about co-innovation and collaboration, we talk a lot about the right enablement model that must be in place in order to help our customers mature across talent, methods, tech and data - all of which are critical in achieving a continuous cycle of innovation. These pillars are critical to delivering innovative digital experience. Without the right team, technology, strategy, platform, and data tools, you’ll be fighting an uphill battle. Trends in the Digital Experience (DX) That Are Critical to Future Success Composable Architecture Trends in headless technology have offered breakthrough improvements in customer experience, but implementing headless as isolated projects limit the total business impact. Composable architecture, on the other hand, provides business agility, speed, and reliability by combining efforts logically at the infrastructure level. Composable architecture is a comprehensive approach to consolidating headless initiatives—ultimately bringing agility to the digital experience infrastructure. Think of composable as the big sister of headless DX architecture. Composable requires more initial planning but brings greater long-term savings through process optimization and flexibility. With composable, you can manage the true value of decoupled systems and create the best-in-class solutions for your business—making composable the future of digital experiences.   What does it mean to have a Composable architecture? Discover more about the latest approach to ecommerce, it's three core architectural tenets, and whether or not the approach is right for you. Read the Guide Customer-Centric Architecture In the early phase of a relationship between your organization and a platform partner, it’s crucial for your partner to understand the business need and your customer so the platform customization can be architected with those factors in mind. When you lose sight of your customers by letting technology dictate your approach, you start serving the means rather than the end, meaning you’re implementing technology for its own sake, rather than serving a business purpose. As our digital ecosystems become more sophisticated and integrate multiple platforms as well as bespoke components, we expect to see a growing trend around customer-centric architecture. Co-Innovation When we work together, we succeed together. Often, departments within an organization talk to each other but have their own unique goals and objectives in mind when building a platform rather than a single set of overarching, unifying goals. That tends to create data silos and issues surrounding the points of control around data flow. A good partner can serve as communicative and connective tissue between the departments in an organization. They will help your team look beyond individual department goals and see a cohesive picture that can better inform the implementation. We expect to see more clients demand this kind of mutuality from their partners in the future.
  Topics: composable, data, transforming, insights, experience, platform, coinnovation, experiences, business, commerce, technology, digital, critical.
• TryNow raises $12M to bring try-before-you-buy, Prime Wardrobe as a service to online retailers - Amazon’s Prime Wardrobe has been a key way for the e-commerce giant to expand its reach selling clothing and other apparel: giving shoppers an easy way to try on several items, return what they don’t want and pay for what they keep has helped it cross the virtual chasm by bringing the online experience a […]
  Topics: retailers, technology, try, trybeforeyoubuy, trynow, wardrobe, payment, raises, shopify, service, build, prime, bring, online, ecommerce, techcrunch.
• Virtual dressing room startup Revery.ai applying computer vision to the fashion industry - Revery.ai is developing a tool that leverages computer vision and artificial intelligence to create a better online dressing room experience.
  Topics: computer, reveryai, room, industry, dressing, using, virtual, technology, fashion, startup, online, users, revery, company, li, vision, techcrunch.
• Visa Wants to Buy Plaid. U.S. Sues - In January 2020, Visa announced it was acquiring Plaid for $5.3 billion. Before long, the U.S. Department of Justice began scrutinizing the transaction, resulting in the filing of an antitrust lawsuit to stop it. In this article, I will describe Plaid and explain why the Department of Justice is attempting to block the deal.
  Topics: technology, company, visas, plaid, department, sues, justice, wants, debit, buy, transaction, visa, financial.
• Visa unveils first innovation hub in Africa to drive product development - Global digital payments giant Visa has opened an innovation studio in Kenya, its first in Africa and sixth globally, after posts in Dubai, London, Miami, San Francisco and Singapore. The studio will bring together developers, Visa’s internal and external clients, and other partners to co-create payment and commerce solutions. “Sub-Saharan Africa is a fast-growing region […]
  Topics: technology, subsaharan, development, visas, unveils, africa, drive, product, solutions, region, visa, hub, payments, techcrunch, studio, innovation.
• Walmart acquires design tool Botmock as its invests in shopping by voice and text - With its latest acquisition Walmart is further investing in technology that will enable shopping via voice and chat. The retail giant announced it’s acquiring “select technology assets” from a startup called Botmock, which had developed a set of tools for designing, prototyping, testing and deploying conversational applications across platforms. Founded in 2016, Botmock got off […]
  Topics: shopping, tools, techcrunch, walmart, chat, botmock, customers, voice, text, design, technology, conversational, acquires, milk, invests, tool.
• Walmart acquires virtual clothing try-on startup Zeekit - Retail giant Walmart announced this morning it’s acquiring the Tel Aviv-based startup Zeekit, which allows consumers to virtually “try on” clothing when shopping online. The company leverages a combination of real-time image processing, computer vision, deep learning and other AI technology to show shoppers how they would look in an item by way of a […]
  Topics: startup, brands, apparel, acquires, walmart, zeekit, clothing, customers, shop, techcrunch, technology, fashion, online, virtual, tryon.
• Walmart launches AI-powered virtual clothing try-on technology for online shoppers - Last May, Walmart announced its acquisition of the virtual clothing try-on startup Zeekit, which leveraged a combination of real-time image processing, computer vision, deep learning and other AI technologies to show shoppers how they would look in an item by way of a simulation that takes into account body dimensions, fit, size and even the […]
  Topics: walmart, model, techcrunch, shopping, customer, clothing, aipowered, shoppers, feature, tryon, virtual, technology, launches, choose, online.
• Wayve, the lidar-free self-driving startup, raises $13.6M from Ocado - Wayve, a U.K.-based self-driving startup that is notable for its use of deep learning and cameras rather than more-costly lidar and other sensors to guide vehicles, is gearing up for its next stage of development with a strategic backer in its pocket. Today Ocado — the online grocer that also powers online grocery systems for […]
  Topics: ocado, solving, company, autonomous, wayves, platform, grocery, techcrunch, lidarfree, wayve, raises, startup, 136m, technology, selfdriving.
• What Is Content Operations? A Straight-Forward Guide - In a 1996 essay, Bill Gates wrote, “Content is king,” and what was true then is still true now. Content is necessary to the success of a business.
  Topics: processes, operations, content, roles, guide, post, straightforward, responsibilities, tools, step, technology, team.
• What Is The Difference Between MACH and Composable Commerce? - If you're in the commerce space, whether you're evaluating vendors or just staying up to date on the latest and greatest trends, then you've probably heard about Headless Commerce, Composable Commerce and MACH. So what are they and how do they differ?     If you're in the commerce space, whether you're evaluating vendors or just staying up to date on the latest and greatest trends, then you've probably heard about Headless Commerce, Composable Commerce and MACH. So what are they and how do they differ?   Headless Commerce Well, firstly, headless commerce is more widely known, since it was established in 2011 by Elastic Path. Its strategy of decoupling the front end of presentation layer from the back end commerce engine enables businesses to deliver continuous customer journeys across multiple touch points without that dependency on the back end slowing you down. Since then, technology has developed more to create more flexibility across these commerce journeys. And here in lies, MACH.   MACH Now MACH simply a collection of technologies wrapped up in an acronym, which stands for: Microservices APIs Cloud Native Headless Commerce    So what does MACH do? Well to understand that you will need to understand each component separately. Microservices are independently deployed packaged business capabilities that enable flexible development to be deployed quickly. APIs, are software intermediaries that allow two or more applications to talk to each other. So this is going to be crucial for accelerated development of new channels and time to market for different commerce experiences. Cloud Native simply means it's just a SaaS model commerce service that allows for elastic scalability and robust security. This means that you'll only have to deploy the capabilities that you need on demand and not your entire full suite at once. So in conclusion, MACH is simply a marketing term that brings all of these flexible technologies together.   Composable Commerce Now Composable Commerce is the approach that brings it all together. This approach equips brands with the core commerce technology, like MACH, assets like partner integrations and expert written guides, as well as full support to compose and optimize your unique commerce solution. Now, Composable Commerce is characterized by three key tenets. Business centric solutions, which include quick starts for building your solution. and business tools that grant marketing teams the control to make changes and remain competitive. Modular architecture, which leverages flexible technology such as JAMStack for your frontend, MACH for your backend and extensive developer tools. An open ecosystem, which consists of a library of assets, integration frameworks as well as full support and guidance for building your entire solution. So as you can see, it's not a direct comparison, because headless is just a small part of MACH and MACH is only a small part of what Composable Commerce enables you to do. To learn more about how you can leverage these MACH based technologies to deploy Composable Commerce, feel free to reach out to us. We'd be happy to help.
  Topics: youre, simply, mach, headless, commerce, difference, technology, technologies, flexible, composable, end.
• What Is an Ad Network and How Does It Work? [+9 Networks to Try] - To state the obvious, researching, finding, and buying digital ad space is a time-consuming process. In fact, an article by the Wall Street Journal compares it to "pulling out weeds online."
  Topics: ad, ads, technology, advertisers, offer, networks, campaign, inventory, does, try, network, work, publishers.
• What is AdTech [+Types Worth Investing In] - Emerging technologies always encourage scrutiny and critical analysis, and ad tech is no different. This discipline has been around for a few years, but it's only recently caught the attention of savvy ad tech agencies. In the era of big data, they've recognized having ad tech company relationships makes them more powerful and attractive to clients.
  Topics: data, mobile, media, worth, advertisers, technology, ad, types, investing, tech, advertising, example, adtech, agencies.
• What is Technographic Data? (And Why It Matters) - Digital transformation is more than just a buzzword — as noted by Forbes, 70% of companies have already deployed a strategy to improve digital service and solution uptake or are actively working on one.
  Topics: information, sales, potential, matters, technographic, companies, marketing, efforts, technology, help, data.
• Why Pinduoduo is putting all its profit into agriculture - For the past few years, Pinduoduo has been widely regarded as Alibaba’s strongest challenger. While Alibaba reported 863 million annual active consumers across its retail platforms in the 12 months ended September, Pinduoduo’s monthly active users exceeded 740 million in the quarter ended September. In its pursuit of new growth engines, Pinduoduo is taking a […]
  Topics: pinduoduo, produce, agricultural, took, technology, putting, agriculture, company, techcrunch, profit, selling, farmers, ecommerce.
• Will AI for Ecommerce Go Mainstream in 2021? - Buzzwords such as "personalization" and "artificial intelligence" have been around ecommerce for years. But could 2021 be the year these technologies go mainstream? Some industry participants believe so.
  Topics: technology, shopping, ecommerce, personalization, product, online, going, mainstream, netflix, ai, movie, data.
• Yami bags $50M Series B to boost its online Asian marketplace - When Alex Zhou, founder and CEO of Yami, moved to the Midwest for college in 2007, he had limited access to Asian groceries and products. Zhou had to drive two hours to purchase his favorite Asian products at the nearest local Asian market. The experience inspired him to launch Yami, a direct-to-consumer marketplace for Asian […]
  Topics: bags, americans, products, boost, 50m, asian, b, data, marketplace, zhou, told, techcrunch, technology, yami, series, million, online.
• clicOH’s shipping technology provides Amazon-like logistics to e-commerce companies in LatAm - The company delivers a package every 20 seconds and services customers of all sizes, from AB inBev and Red Bull to small Shopify merchants.
  Topics: technology, shipping, provides, funding, latin, saravia, round, companies, amazonlike, latam, company, america, techcrunch, clicohs, logistics, ecommerce, novillo.