ESW to Buy Fellow eCommerce Player Scalefast

Direct-to-consumer (D2C) eCommerce company ESW is set to acquire Scalefast, an eCommerce technology provider, pending regulatory approvals expected by mid-2022.

According to the Monday (May 9) announcement, the three founders of Scalefast — Chief Executive Nicolas Stehle, Chief Technology Officer Frédéric Bocquet and Chief Marketing Officer Olivier Schott — will join ESW’s senior leadership team. Terms of the deal for privately held Scalefast were not disclosed.

“The acquisition will further extend ESW’s market strength across apparel, beauty, personal care and luxury brands to include entertainment, gaming and electronics,” the companies said in a press release.

Meanwhile, Scalefast’s capabilities in data analytics and speed-to-market efforts will let the combined company push forward with new offerings such as digital pop-up stores and “highly specialized” D2C advertising campaigns.

In marketing materials, ESW said that it specializes in payments and logistics, and the company claims to make “global shopping better, safer, simpler and faster, end-to-end.” The combined company will have about 1,000 employees, according to the announcement.

“Scalefast’s technology offering is highly complementary and will enable ESW to unleash new capabilities and deliver even faster direct-to-consumer ecommerce growth for new and existing clients,” Tommy Kelly, founder and CEO of ESW, said in the release.

ESW said that as eCommerce continues to grow globally, “brands are seeking more specialized and localized services for differentiation and to remain competitive,” adding that Scalefast builds eCommerce stores “faster than any of its competitors.”

“Scalefast’s services are highly synergistic with ESW’s from a revenue generation perspective,” Stehle said. “We are excited by this opportunity to join in a bold vision for the future of DTC ecommerce. Scalefast and ESW’s blended knowledge, expertise, and technology will provide distinct competitive advantages as a fully integrated technology-driven commerce service provider.”