Amazon’s agent war 🤖

Happy Sunday! Amazon just picked a fight with the future of shopping. Its legal battle with Perplexity defines who owns the next checkout: the user or the platform. Meanwhile, it quietly launched Bazaar, a $10 store built to steal Temu’s lunch. And across markets from Paris to Osaka, retail is rewriting itself—slower, cheaper, smarter.

Maze Focus🌀
🤖 Amazon’s agent war
🛒 Amazon goes Temu
🛍️ Shopify owns APAC
🇪🇺 Europe’s business rebound
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Last week handpicked news you need to know
🛒 General Ecommerce
👗 Vertical Ecommerce

LET’S ENTER THE MAZE!
- Artur Stańczuk, MarketMaze Founder

The Maze: Amazon filed a legal broadside at Perplexity’s Comet, arguing the agent masquerades as a user and breaks its rules. Perplexity says agents act with user consent. The clash sets the ground rules for how AI clicks, pays, and delivers in 2026.

Why it matters: If platforms win, agents must play by house rules and label themselves. If agents win, assistants become shoppers and own the cart. Either way, checkout control shifts and ecommerce margins move with it.

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The Maze: Amazon launched Bazaar, a low cost app for price sensitive buyers across Asia, Africa, and LatAm. Most items sit under $10 with delivery around two weeks and free returns in 15 days. It is Amazon’s sandbox to win value shoppers without touching Prime metrics.

Why it matters: The next 500M buyers choose price over speed. If repeat rates beat returns, Bazaar becomes Amazon’s on ramp to Prime in emerging markets. If not, Amazon still blocks rivals from owning the value segment.

Expanding into Europe offers access to millions of new customers - but it also comes with complex tax rules, language barriers, and marketplace compliance that can slow sellers down.

That’s why more brands are turning to fully managed solutions that simplify the entire expansion process - without extra hires, VAT headaches, or complex compliance requirements, such as:

✔️ Marketplace setup, listing localization, and content management
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✔️ Fulfillment and logistics handled end-to-end

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The Maze: Shopify is now APAC’s default shop engine in markets like the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Singapore, and Malaysia, while WooCommerce leads in Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand, and Cafe24 holds Korea. Speed, apps, and cross border rails beat pure flexibility.

Why it matters: APAC brands live on marketplaces but need D2C to own data and margin. Shopify’s ecosystem shortens time to launch and unifies wallets and shipping. The platform choice becomes a cost of time decision.

The Maze: Europe posted more firm births than deaths in 2023, a net positive after energy and inflation shocks. The headline hides a split with closures outpacing openings in several countries, but momentum returned across much of the bloc.

Why it matters: A rising birth to death ratio expands the customer pipe for digital and retail services. More entrants mean new partners and competition. For operators, green heavy markets hint at faster ecommerce demand and new local niches.

🇺🇸 Retail layoffs hit 1M in 2025. October was the worst in 22 years as retailers cut roles, slowed hiring, and leaned on automation to protect holiday margins.

🇺🇸 AliExpress opens doors to US sellers. Zero commission and free onboarding aim to seed local assortment before peak shopping, pitching marketing and dispute support to merchants seeking extra demand.

🇩🇪 Otto buys back Hermes Germany stake. The move unwinds a 2020 split and restores control as delivery shifts to lockers and out of home while networks chase profit and automation.

🌏 TikTok Shop nears eBay size. Global sales approached eBay’s GMV as the U.S. surged and Southeast Asia led on video shopping, compressing discovery and checkout into the feed.

🇺🇸 Etsy adds US specific pricing. Sellers can tailor U.S. prices to handle duties without overcharging other markets, supporting conversion and margin on tariff-hit goods.

🇺🇸 Walmart adds AI audio on product pages. Short clips summarize specs and reviews for mobile shoppers to speed comparison and cut returns.

🇫🇷 France flags Shein over illegal listings. Items were pulled and proceedings paused, but inspections stay active with potential fines up to 6% of global turnover under DSA rules.

🇩🇪 Zalando beats Q3 and backs sport pivot. GMV reached €4.2B and revenue €3.0B as a new five-year German FA tie-up targets frequency and brand heat into peak season.

🇩🇪 Gerry Weber returns to online. A new DACH unit and partners relaunch e-commerce with marketplace tests and tighter costs after restructuring and store closures.

🇯🇵 Zara opens Osaka megastore with café. A four-level flagship adds Zacaffè to boost dwell time while RFID, self-checkout, and pickup services lift conversion on Japan’s busiest strip.

🇬🇧 M&S taps Zalando and TikTok Shop. Routing EU DTC through ZEOS fixes cross-border pain while TikTok tests creator commerce across 21 markets to diversify demand.

🇩🇪 Otto launches AI advisor for Manufactum. A conversational assistant guides material and care choices to cut returns and deepen storytelling across premium home and apparel.

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MarketMaze team