State of Main AI Shopping Agents 🛒

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🧠 Big Story: 
State of Main AI Shopping Agents 🛒

📊 Key Data:
Ad Winners in a Post-Temu World

📖 Ecommerce players news:
🇺🇸 Walmart to hike prices due to Trump tariffs.
🇪🇺 TikTok Shop expands pre-owned sales to Europe.
🇺🇸 Shein Slashes Prices After U.S.-China Trade Truce.
🇬🇧 ASOS Launches UK’s First Nationwide Locker Delivery.
🇺🇸 DoorDash & Wing Launch Drone Delivery in Charlotte.
🇺🇸 Kraft Heinz & Uber Eats Launch Heinz Verified Program.

+ over 15 handpicked hot ecommerce news from the last week you need to know 🔥

MarketMaze is here to make the e-commerce world smarter—period. But for this mission to matter, we need scale. Translation? Share this newsletter with someone who’s still using 2019 playbooks. And quick update: the Retail Media Deep Dive is almost ready. Soon you’ll get a 60+ page, data-packed monster—everything from ad market stats to why retail media is eating Google’s lunch. Stay tuned. Let’s grow, let’s get smart, and let’s win.

State of Main AI Shopping Agents 🛒

AI is gunning for your wallet, and Silicon Valley’s heavyweights want to do your shopping for you. Four agents—Perplexity, Amazon, OpenAI, and Microsoft—promise frictionless commerce, but every one of them stumbles at the last mile: global, seamless checkout. Who actually gets you from “add to cart” to “order confirmed,” and who’s just throwing digital confetti? Buckle up: the battle for the future of shopping just hit warp speed.

Perplexity – Buy with Pro

Perplexity’s “Buy with Pro” offers an agentic commerce solution, letting U.S. Pro users (via $20/mo subscription) search, compare, and complete purchases directly in chat. The PayPal and Venmo integration (summer 2025) enables one-click checkout for products, travel, and event tickets, with PayPal managing payments, shipping, tracking, and support. Perplexity started with Shopify integration in Nov 2024 and now extends checkout to any PayPal merchant. The company is finalizing a $500M round at a $14B valuation. Positioned as the first LLM-based AI to close the loop from discovery to transaction, Perplexity is redefining agentic, cross-platform commerce.

Amazon – Buy for Me

Amazon’s “Buy for Me” launched in April 2025 as a beta in the Amazon app, enabling purchases from non-Amazon brand sites when inventory isn’t available on Amazon. The agent completes the checkout using encrypted customer info, while payment is confirmed in-app; fulfillment, returns, and support are handled by brand partners. Limited to select U.S. users and partner brands, it’s powered by Bedrock, Claude, and Nova models. This feature extends Amazon’s retail reach and positions its AI as a bridge between search, purchase, and third-party fulfillment.

OpenAI – ChatGPT Shopping

Launched April 2025, OpenAI’s ChatGPT Shopping surfaces product results with images, pricing, reviews, and direct merchant links—now available for all users globally, with no ads or affiliate bias. While users cannot yet check out directly in chat, the system enables fast, personalized comparison and redirection to merchant sites. Powered by structured metadata and LLM context, ChatGPT’s shopping UI benefits from over 1 billion weekly web searches, with rising AI-driven retail engagement. OpenAI is expected to add agentic checkout as the competitive landscape evolves.

Microsoft – Copilot Shopping

Microsoft Copilot Shopping, launched May 2025, integrates product discovery, reviews, and real-time merchant offers into the Copilot app, supporting checkout and price tracking through its Merchant Program. The platform aims to provide a seamless AI-driven shopping and payment experience within Bing, Edge, and Windows. Early-stage issues persist around SKU mapping, inventory freshness, and variation handling, but Copilot is positioned to become Microsoft’s transactional commerce layer, further enhanced by upcoming collaborations with major payments providers like Mastercard.

What’s Next? 🧭

Looking ahead, we expect the AI shopping agent landscape to rapidly expand beyond today’s four leading platforms. In the U.S., Google, Apple, Anthropic (Claude), and Meta are best positioned to launch competitive agents—each leveraging vast user bases, payment integrations, and merchant relationships to accelerate adoption. Meanwhile, Chinese tech giants are poised to drive the next wave of disruption: companies like Alibaba, Baidu, Tencent, and ByteDance already dominate domestic e-commerce and are developing agentic capabilities that could leapfrog current U.S. solutions. Wild cards like Deepseek, Manus, Pinduoduo, and Weibo also have the technical depth and commercial scale to quickly enter the Western market. The race is on, and the next dominant AI shopping agent may well emerge from these emerging challengers, not today’s incumbents.

Ad Winners in a Post-Temu World

Last month, Temu turned off all US ads.
Interesting part? What happened next!

𝗜𝘁 𝗰𝗿𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝗳𝗮𝘀𝘁
In just 3 days, Temu’s Google Shopping share tanked.
App rank? From Top 3 to #46 in 48 hours.
By April 30th, they were out of the Top 100.

That meant one thing:
Massive ad visibility—suddenly up for grabs.

𝗪𝗵𝗼 𝘁𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗶𝘁?
Smec and Mike Ryan pulled daily auction data across thousands of advertisers.

SMBs = No meaningful gain
Big brands = Major wins
• Etsy (20pp lift in some categories)
• eBay
• Target
• Walmart
• Kohl’s
• Shop (Shopify)
• Best Buy
• Dick’s Sporting Goods

Amazon? Nowhere to be seen 👀

Innovative companies dramatically outperform in long-term shareholder returns.

McKinsey & Company explores how firms mastering both growth and innovation achieved double the median excess TSR versus peers between 2012 and 2022. This piece is a data-driven look at why combining innovation with profitable growth sets industry leaders apart. 👉 McKinsey & Company

OpenAI’s $300B valuation: wild or inevitable?

Simon Taylor on LinkedIn breaks down OpenAI’s projected revenue explosion, with new agents and products fueling targets up to $125B by 2029. It’s a sharp take on why these forecasts are bold—and why some investors still believe the hype. 👉 Simon Taylor on LinkedIn

🇺🇸 Walmart to hike prices due to Trump tariffs. Walmart plans to raise prices on goods like bananas and car seats due to Trump’s tariffs, despite a US-China trade deal lowering tariffs to 30%. CEO Doug McMillon says it’s tough to keep costs low with tight margins. 👉 Financial Times

🇪🇺 TikTok Shop expands pre-owned sales to Europe. TikTok Shop now sells second-hand luxury goods and electronics in six EU countries, including Germany and France. It uses strict anti-counterfeit rules and competes with eBay. 👉 Ecommerce News

🇨🇦 Shopify upgrades Sidekick AI for merchants. Shopify’s Sidekick AI now helps merchants analyze sales drops and create better store images in 20 languages. It uses advanced reasoning to boost marketing and sales. 👉 FashionNetwork

🇦🇷 Mercado Libre fights Chinese rivals in LatAm. Mercado Libre, with $21B in 2024 revenue, uses local expertise and AI to counter Temu and Shein. It’s gearing up for Mexico’s Hot Sale to stay dominant. 👉 Wired España

🇸🇬 Shopee’s parent Sea sees $4.8B Q1 revenue. Sea Limited’s revenue grew 29.6% to $4.8B, with Shopee’s sales up 28.7%. CEO Forrest Li says all businesses, including gaming and payments, are thriving. 👉 Inside Retail Asia

🇺🇸 eBay launches Certified Open Box program. eBay’s new program gives used electronics and home goods a trust badge and one-year warranty. It helps sellers stand out and boosts buyer confidence. 👉 eBay Seller Center

🇵🇱 Temu tops Allegro in Poland user count. Temu has 18.86M users vs. Allegro’s 17.85M in Poland, but Allegro’s 15.97M engaged users show stronger loyalty. Engagement drives e-commerce success. 👉 StockWatch.pl

🇺🇸 Shein Slashes Prices After U.S.-China Trade Truce. Shein cut U.S. prices after tariffs on Chinese imports dropped from 145% to 30% and low-value packages from 120% to 54% for 90 days. The move aims to boost affordability, but Shein’s IPO remains on hold due to tariff uncertainty. 👉 Pymnts

🇬🇧 ASOS Launches UK’s First Nationwide Locker Delivery. ASOS partnered with InPost to offer next-day delivery to 16,000 UK lockers, free for Premium Members. The service, with 24/7 access and easy returns, enhances convenience for shoppers. 👉 Mirror

🇬🇧 Luxe Collective Shuts Down After £500K Theft. Luxe Collective, a re-commerce platform, is closing after a July 2024 theft of £500K in stock. The loss led to staff redundancies and the end of the business founded in 2018. 👉 Fashion United

🇬🇧 Superdrug Adds 60 Fashion Brands to Online Marketplace. Superdrug expanded its online platform with brands like Nike and Wrangler to become a lifestyle destination. The 2025 strategy targets inclusive fashion and a broader customer base. 👉 Retail Gazette

🇪🇸 Veepee Opens Third Office in Madrid for Growth. Veepee, with €3.3B in 2024 turnover, opened a new Madrid office to strengthen its flash sales model in Spain. The move supports collaborations with fashion and tech brands. 👉 Fashion United UK

🇩🇪 Mytheresa’s Sales Rise, U.S. Tariffs Loom. Mytheresa’s sales grew 12.7% to €234.7M in Q3 2024, driven by Europe and Asia demand. Potential U.S. tariffs could slow future growth, prompting cost management. 👉 Drapers Online

🇩🇪 Mister Spex Starts Glasses Subscription Model. Mister Spex launched a €19.90/month subscription in Germany, offering two pairs of glasses yearly. The model aims to provide affordability and recurring revenue. 👉 Mister Spex

🇦🇺 Frasers Group Launches Elevate Retail Media Network. Frasers Group introduced Elevate, powered by Zitcha, to boost targeted ads across brands like Sports Direct. It leverages first-party data for retail media growth. 👉 Mumbrella

🇺🇸 DoorDash & Wing Launch Drone Delivery in Charlotte. DoorDash and Wing started drone delivery in Charlotte, NC, covering a 4-mile radius from The Arboretum, offering food from Panera Bread and DashMart items. Panera’s $1 mac & cheese deal runs until May 28, 2025, to boost the launch. 👉 DoorDash Newsroom

🇺🇸 Kraft Heinz & Uber Eats Launch Heinz Verified Program. Kraft Heinz and Uber Eats rolled out “Heinz Verified” to highlight restaurants serving Heinz Ketchup in six U.S. cities, offering $5 off $30+ orders. A YouTube series, “Daytrippin’,” promotes local food scenes with Steven He. 👉 Brand Innovators

🇺🇸 Uber Eats & OpenTable Plan App Integration for Fall. Uber Eats and OpenTable will add a “Dine Out” tab for restaurant reservations in the Uber Eats app by fall 2025. The feature aims to make dining out easier across the U.S., Canada, UK, and more. 👉 Restaurant Dive

🇺🇸 DoorDash Driver Admits to $2.5M Fraud Scheme. Sayee Chaitanya Reddy Devagiri pleaded guilty to stealing $2.5M from DoorDash via fake deliveries from 2020-2021. He faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250K fine for the scam. 👉 USA Today

🇪🇺 Wolt Launches Self-Service Ads Platform. Wolt’s Wolt Ads, launched in April 2024, reaches 50M+ users in 30+ countries, with Europe’s retail media market set to hit €31B by 2028. Campaigns like Coca-Cola’s boosted sales 134% for non-alcoholic beer. 👉 ESM Magazine

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