eCommerce news round-up

Here are the headlines that grabbed our attention this past week.

Business and Technology:

Eventbrite partners with Teespring to bring ecommerce to its events platform

• Venture Beat: Eventbrite, the world’s largest self-service ticketing platform, is teaming up with t-shirt platform Teespring in the first ecommerce integration for Eventbrite’s API platform. This new relationship will allow organizers to offer branded apparel to event-goers with ease, offering new ways for event attendees to connect to their favorite artists and entertainers, and strengthening Eventbrite’s developer platform, Eventbrite Spectrum.

Alibaba fund invests in Hong Kong ecommerce startup

• Tech in Asia: Alibaba’s not-for-profit initiative, the Hong Kong Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund, has selected Shopline for its most recent round of investments. Shopline is a B2B e-commerce platform, which aims to help small and medium businesses set up modern, optimized online shops. Together, the companies work towards helping SMBs in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia tap into the global ecommerce market.

Fashion invasion: iFashion snaps up INVADE, online marketplace for retail spaces

• e27: Southeast Asia’s iFashion Group is continuing on its strategy of acquisitions with its recent purchase of INVADE, an online booking platform that takes an AirBnB-like approach to helping pop-up stores rent retail space. This is the latest step in iFashion Group’s journey towards an IPO on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX).

How one e-commerce giant uses microservices and open source to scale like crazy

• Tech Republic: With ecommerce companies all over the world experiencing incredible growth, many are turning their focus towards developing architecture that can easily scale, without disrupting business. Eric Bowman, head of engineering at German e-commerce giant Zalando, speaks about microservices architecture, and how it can give ecommerce companies “Radical Agility”.

Around the World:

India evolving into smart entrepreneur economy

• First Post: India has been developing strength in entrepreneurship for several generations now, producing intelligent, well educated, highly trained individuals. Initially, these professionals were employed in outsourcing capabilities, usually providing service support.  Today, India’s entrepreneurs are well poised to expand globally on their own, by following China’s example and thriving in the online economy.

Jokowi urges development of e-commerce

• Jakarta Post: President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo is calling on domestic and foreign businesses to work together to strengthen Indonesia’s online economy. He notes that, while Indonesia is lagging in e-commerce, the entry of Alibaba into this market is proof of the country’s potential. He urges Indonesian businesses to cooperate with start-ups from around the world to improve their digital economy.