All posts tagged: Fulfillment

Amazon fulfillment competitor Stord raises 0M at B valuation

Amazon fulfillment competitor Stord raises $250M at $3B valuation

Published by skeptic

E-commerce logistics company Stord has raised a $250 million round at a $3 billion valuation, it announced Tuesday. This doubles its valuation from a year-ago round. The new funding was led by Strike Capital with participation from Kleiner Perkins, Founders Fund, Franklin Templeton, Baillie Gifford, G Squared, and Bond. Stord was founded in 2015 by then-college students CEO Sean Henry and CTO Jacob Boudreau while they were still at Georgia Tech. It was soaring along, run by the two young founders, through the frothy pandemic-era of VC funding, hitting unicorn status in 2021. The startup survived the subsequent VC funding winter and in 2025, raised a $200 million mega round, also led by Strike Capital, that brought it to a $1.5 billion valuation. It has now raised a total of about $775 million to date. Stord offers a network of physical warehouses and inventory management software for e-commerce. It bills itself as a sort of anti-Amazon, giving brands “the speed to compete” while still owning their customer relationships. In this AI age, the Atlanta-based fulfillment …

Amazon to Add 3.5% Fulfillment Surcharge as Fuel Costs Rise

Amazon to Add 3.5% Fulfillment Surcharge as Fuel Costs Rise

Published by skeptic

Amazon will add a 3.5% fuel and logistics-related surcharge to fulfillment fees it charges third-party merchants, as the war in the Middle East, which began with US and Israeli strikes against Iran at the end of February, continues to drive up fuel costs. The fee will be applied to third-party sellers across Fulfillment by Amazon in the US and Canada beginning April 17,  Amazon said in a note to sellers on Thursday.  “Elevated costs in fulfillment and logistics have increased the cost of operating across the industry,” Amazon wrote in its announcement. “We have absorbed these increased costs so far. However, similar to other major carriers, when costs remain elevated, we implement temporary surcharges on our fulfillment fees to recover a portion of the actual cost increases we are experiencing.”   Amazon said the new surcharge is “meaningfully lower” than what is charged by other major carriers. Its surcharge will average about 17 cents per unit in the US, but the cost will vary based on the item’s size, Amazon said. Amazon’s announcement comes amid …