I get the appeal of marketplaces but, the first agentic checkouts ran through DTC. ChatGPT's instant checkout launched Shopify brands like Glossier and SKIMS, over an open protocol. Meanwhile Amazon spent the same months suing Perplexity to keep a shopping agent off its site.
Good point. DTC has the infrastructure of Shopify to lean back on. But given how shaky the roll out was and how much infrastructure still has to be built to support agentic commerce, a marketplace with a blank check to invest is bound to leap ahead. Although the perplexity lawsuit seemed petty, Amazon set a line in the sand for all browser automations to take note of. They don’t want to share the future with anyone.
I get the appeal of marketplaces but, the first agentic checkouts ran through DTC. ChatGPT's instant checkout launched Shopify brands like Glossier and SKIMS, over an open protocol. Meanwhile Amazon spent the same months suing Perplexity to keep a shopping agent off its site.
Good point. DTC has the infrastructure of Shopify to lean back on. But given how shaky the roll out was and how much infrastructure still has to be built to support agentic commerce, a marketplace with a blank check to invest is bound to leap ahead. Although the perplexity lawsuit seemed petty, Amazon set a line in the sand for all browser automations to take note of. They don’t want to share the future with anyone.