E-commerce Industry News Recap - Week of June 26th, 2023

This is a summary recap of the 127th Edition of the Shopifreaks E-commerce Newsletter - brought to you by Paul Drecksler. Check out the full edition for links and sources.

1. TikTok  is testing a new shopping section called #TrendyBeat where it offers products for sale that are shipped and sold by its parent company, ByteDance . The new shopping section offers popular items that have appeared in trending videos, such as tools to exact ear wax or strawberry destemmers, and is being tested exclusively in the U.K. Trendy Beat is currently NOT being tested in the U.S., where TikTok says it's focused on adding new merchants to its TikTok Shop offering.
2. Shopify  is opening its #ShopPay payment method to enterprise stores — even if they aren't on Shopify. Historically the payment method has been exclusive to merchants within the Shopify ecosystem (less a few select integrations which I mention below). The company is turning Shop Pay into a commerce component, enabling enterprise stores in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand, to add the payment method to their lineup at checkout. Two years ago in June 2021, I reported that Shop Pay opened itself up to retailers selling through Google and Facebook. Now Shop Pay is spreading its wings to reach the internal checkouts for large brands on their own D2C websites.
3. Retail subscription programs like #AmazonPrime and #Walmart+ are facing growing scrutiny by the #FTC, which filed a lawsuit against Amazon for duping millions of consumers into purchasing subscriptions for its Prime services. The FTC said in the complaint that for years, Amazon “knowingly complicated the cancellation process for Prime subscribers who sought to end their membership,” and that Amazon “substantially revamped its Prime cancellation process” to some customers before the lawsuit was filed.
4. Patreon  is rolling out an expansion of its tools for digital creators that include the ability to sell one-off digital goods and offer free subscriptions. The company says that creators can use the free subscription product like a newsletter, or a way to reach all their biggest fans at once, and hopefully get free members to make a monthly pledge later by incentivizing them with perks. The ability to sell one-off digital products like like videos, podcasts, or other downloadable files also allows Patreon creators to keep their fans shopping on the platform, where they already do business, as opposed to directing them to other platforms to make product purchases.
5. This year  Amazon  will hold its #PrimeDay sale on July 11th and 12th. Other retailers with competing events include:

• Walmart  will hold its first Walmart+ Week beginning July 10th, which will overlap with Prime Days.
• Target  will hold a sales event July 9-15 for Target Circle members, its free rewards program.
• Best Buy  is holding a holiday-themed sale event July 10-12.
• Newegg  will hold a sale July 10-14, with a presale beginning earlier on July 5th.
• Hasbro  will sell Furby for the first time since 2016 during Amazon Prime Day in honor of its 25th Anniversary.

1. During the past few years, many sellers have been hit with massive lawsuits for IP infringement filed in Chicago. The total number of cases has grown over 500% in the past 5 years. Last year, 938 Schedule A lawsuits were filed in the U.S., each targeting dozens or hundreds of defendants, of which about 85% were filed in the federal court in Chicago, and about one-third by a single law firm. (That firm should obviously be investigated.) 70% of the sellers targeted are Chinese, and many feel that they are being targeted because they aren't familiar with the U.S. legal system and cannot easily defend themselves.
2. OpenAI  is considering launching a marketplace for customers to sell AI models they customize for their own needs to other businesses. The marketplace would be OpenAI's version of an app store, offering businesses a way to access apps for sniffing out financial fraud or answering questions about specific markets with up-to-date information, among other things. The goal is to make advanced chatbots more useful across industries.
3. Amazon , Fazz , an Asian business finance platform, and Grab , a Singaporean superapp, are collaborating on an e-commerce use case for Purpose Bound Money (PBM) that allows payment to be released to the merchant only when the customer receives the items purchased. #PBM contains “digital money as a store of value and programming logic denoting its use based on programmed conditions.” Once those conditions are met, “digital money is released, and it becomes unbounded once again.”
4. YouTube  is set to launch its first official livestream shopping channel in South Korea on June 30th, which will feature over 30 prominent brands including Samsung, LG, Baskin-Robbins, Dunkin' Donuts, and more. The launch will serve as a pilot project, with plans to potentially extend its operation beyond the initially planned 90 days.
5. Shopify  is being asked by the Canada Revenue Agency to hand over tax records of more than 121,000 Canadian stores from the last six years. CEO Tobias Lütke tweeted, “This feels like low-key overreach to me. We will fight this.”
6. Amazon Web Services (AWS) Web Services allocated $100M to its new Generative AI Innovation Center, a program that supports customers in developing and deploying generative AI solutions. Amazon believes the program will enable them to create and launch new AI products, services, and processes.
7. Deutsche Post DHL Group is changing its name to just DHL Group as of July 1st, to reflect the world's greater recognition of the DHL brand, except for in Germany where it will continue to run by its current name. The company noted that more than 90% of its revenue comes from the business trading under a DHL brand rather than the Deutsche Post name.
8. Sezzle  launched a subscription-based service that lets shoppers use its Virtual Card anywhere Visa cards are accepted online or in-store to pay for their purchases in installments. The new Sezzle Pay Anywhere also allows shoppers to earn 1% back on eligible transactions and opt-in to build credit through Sezzle Up.
9. eBay  is encouraging sellers to automated the rates they pay for Promoted Listing Ads based on its daily suggestions, but sellers are weary that it's just a ploy to extract more fee income from them. eBay says the feature is designed to help sellers keep the ads competitive without having to manually set the rates as conditions change — but “competitive” doesn't always mean “less”.
10. U.S. lawmakers proposed a ban on #BNPL loans to finance semiautomatic weapons that would include levying hefty fines on companies that enable the transactions and dealers that accept them. Installment loans drew heightened scrutiny after the Uvalde, Texas school shooter was found to have purchased a gun manufactured by Daniel Defense, which offers financing plans.
11. Amazon pledged to hire more than 5,000 #refugees in Europe, along with 40 other companies who collectively pledged to hire, train, or connect with 250,000 refugees, of which at least 13,680 will get jobs directly with the companies. Most jobs will be hourly roles at fulfillment and storage centers and in transport and delivery, which the company has been struggling to find workers for these roles. So should we pat these companies on the back for hiring desperate doctor refugees from Ukraine as underpaid / overworked warehouse packers? I'm not sure how to feel about that one.
12. FedEx Express upgraded its Ship Manager application, enabling customers to synchronize their Shopify , BigCommerce , or Woo store with the service. The upgrade is live across 34 countries and territories in Europe and allows merchants to manage their e-commerce shipments, sync orders with their stores, automatically add tracking numbers to orders, create shipments and print labels for multiple orders in one click, and instantly generate commercial invoices.
13. The UK launched its first E-Commerce Trade Commission to support the more than 70k SMEs that could start exporting with the right support. The commission will run for two years and have three main objectives: simplification, perception, and promotion.
14. Shopify  partnered with Adyen as a payment provider to support its international expansion into the enterprise sector. The app will allow large companies to accept and process payments instantly and will include a payments app that supports Apple Pay and Google Pay, along with other local payment methods later this year.
15. Jane Technologies, Inc.  launched a new #POS platform for cannabis shops that integrates with its existing e-commerce and advertising solutions and includes a debit card payment system, custom hardware, and a personalized in-store shopping experience. When a shopper enters a dispensary, they must scan their government-issued ID, which then allows the POS to serve the budtender with a list of products previously purchased by the customer and a list of recommended products backed by verified reviews.
16. Alibaba Group  named Eddie Wu as its new CEO, who will succeed Daniel Zhang in the role. Zhang, who currently serves as chairman of the company’s e-commerce group, will head Alibaba's cloud-computing unit, which has been approved to be spun off and is expected to be listed for trading within a year.
17. Walmart  was the first retailer to test out TalkShopLive's new shoppable simulcast feature, which allows brands to broadcast live shopping events simultaneously across up to four different online platforms including the TalkShopLive platform, their own website, and Facebook (ie: multiple FB pages). Once a brand goes live on Facebook, a customer can type “BUY” as comment during the show and immediately receive the products in FB Messenger for checkout without ever needing to leave Facebook.
18. A critical security flaw has been disclosed in Automattic 's Abandoned Cart Lite for WooCommerce plugin, which is used by over 30k websites. The vulnerability makes it possible for an attacker to gain access to the accounts of users who have abandoned their carts, and has been rated 9.8 out of 10 for severity on the CVSS scoring system.
19. Dow, a materials science company, announced its collaboration with Procter & Gamble China to spearhead an air capsule e-commerce packaging, which aims to protect products while avoiding excessive packaging. The air capsule packaging reduces material weight by 40% compared to corrugated boxes, requiring only 25% of original trucking and 75% less warehouse space.
20. Maersk Group  unveiled a new e-commerce fulfillment solution in India called ‘One Country, One Price', which offers a flat rate of INR 80 ($1.00) per order. The solution will include 60 days of storage, delivery across India covering 18,000 pin codes in 48 hours, 20% returns to origin, and at no fixed monthly costs or minimum orders.
21. Plus 11 seed rounds, IPOs, and acquisitions of interest including DPReview acquisition by Gear Patrol prior to being shut down by Amazon.

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See you next week!

PAUL

#ecommerce #ecommercenews #ecommercebusiness #ecommercewebsite #marketing #tech #retail #commerce #shopify #bigcommerce #amazon #wix #instagram #meta #facebook #temu #china #bnpl