Acquired

The Shopify IPO

Aug 6, 2019

Explore the incredible rise of Shopify, from its start as a snowboard gear retailer to competing with e-commerce giants like Amazon. Discover the unconventional insights of CEO Tobi Lütke and how his passion for gaming shaped his entrepreneurial journey. Dive into the innovative strategies that fueled Shopify's growth and its unique business model that empowers smaller merchants. The podcast also touches on the company’s financial performance, especially post-IPO, and the implications of evolving market dynamics in e-commerce.

01:30:35

Creator website

Highlights

AI Chapters

Episode notes

Web Design Consulting

02:50

The Structural Problem with Amazon

01:05

Toby's Engineering Obsession

01:12

The History of Yahoo! Stores and the Inception of Ruby on Rails

01:19

Intro

2min

Revolutionizing Productivity with AI Assistance

2min

The Early Influences of a Tech Visionary

4min

From Gaming to Entrepreneurship

6min

From Snowboarding to Shopify: The Journey of Innovation

18min

Shopify's Growth Journey

17min

Analyzing Shopify's Market Position

4min

Shopify vs. Amazon: A Valuation Analysis

8min

Shopify's Strategic Growth and E-commerce Disruption

20min

10.

Strategic Growth and Innovation Insights

9min

Ben and David head north of the border to Ottawa, Canada to cover perhaps one of the greatest IPO success stories of the past 5 years, Shopify. From humble beginnings as a “lifestyle business” hawking hipster snowboard gear online to now routinely mentioned in the same breath as Amazon, the tale of Shopify and its incredible CEO Tobi Lütke’s ascent is not one to miss!

Editor's note: Shopify actually powered $41b of sales, not $14b, in 2018, as discussed toward the end of the episode. $14b was the fourth-quarter number. While this changes the analysis of value captured at the end of the episode (Shopify only captures 2.5% of merchant sales as their own revenue, not 7%, which is admittedly very different), it doesn’t change overall sentiment on the company discussed in the episode.

Sponsors:

Sentry: https://bit.ly/acquiredsentry
Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta
ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredsn

Links:

https://www.snowdevil.ca
https://www.jadedpixel.com
Citron’s “research” report: https://citronresearch.com/citron-exposes-the-dark-side-of-shopify/

Carve Outs:

Ben: Moment smartphone camera lenses: https://www.shopmoment.com
David: Quoteapro engineering and head of product roles, Bill Gurley on Invest like the Best: http://investorfieldguide.com/gurley/

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