Whatnot acquires Shaped to power real-time live shopping recommendations

Whatnot, the livestream shopping platform, has acquired Shaped, a machine learning startup specializing in real-time recommendation and search systems, to enhance its AI-driven personalization features. The acquisition was announced Wednesday and marks a strategic step in Whatnot's expansion into new product categories and a growing user base. By integrating Shaped’s technology, Whatnot aims to improve the speed and accuracy of its recommendation engine, which is critical for navigating the fast-paced nature of live commerce. Live commerce presents unique challenges compared to traditional e-commerce. Product inventories, auction timelines, and buyer behavior shift rapidly, often within seconds. Whatnot’s marketplace operates under these conditions, with live shows starting and ending continuously, and inventory changing minute by minute. To address these complexities, Whatnot has been investing heavily in AI technologies over the past six years, reducing recommendation latency from approximately a day to just minutes. The integration of Shaped’s real-time recommendation system is expected to further shorten this gap, enabling near-instantaneous, hyper-personalized suggestions for users. Shaped, founded to assist businesses in building AI-powered recommendation engines, leverages large language models and machine learning to create tailored search and discovery experiences. Its clients include industry leaders such as Outdoorsy and QVC. The company’s technology allows for dynamic adjustments based on current data, making it particularly suited for environments where information is constantly evolving. As part of the acquisition, Shaped’s founder and CEO, Tullie Murrell, along with nearly a dozen engineers and AI researchers, will join Whatnot. Murrell will lead the newly established Applied AI Research group, bringing expertise gained from her previous role at Meta to the team. This acquisition aligns with Whatnot’s recent growth trajectory. Since its launch in 2019, the company has seen exponential expansion, including surpassing one billion total orders from sellers. In early 2025, Whatnot secured $225 million in Series F funding, boosting its valuation beyond $11 billion. The company has also expanded its marketplace significantly, introducing over 35 new categories in the past year alone, ranging from art and golf to vinyl. During the first half of 2025, more than 45 additional categories were launched, with new subcategories being added monthly. This diversification reflects Whatnot’s ambition to cater to a broader range of consumer interests and market demands. The move also coincides with a broader trend among resale platforms to incorporate AI into their services. Companies such as eBay and Poshmark are actively exploring ways to leverage artificial intelligence to enhance user experience and operational efficiency. Whatnot’s acquisition of Shaped positions it well within this competitive landscape, offering a robust technological foundation to support its ongoing growth and innovation efforts. With the integration of Shaped’s technology, Whatnot plans to refine its recommendation algorithms further, ensuring they adapt seamlessly to the unpredictable dynamics of live commerce. The company’s systems already process over 500,000 hours of live video and millions of real-time interactions weekly, using this data to continually optimize performance. The addition of Shaped’s capabilities is anticipated to elevate these processes to new levels of responsiveness and precision, ultimately enhancing the overall shopping experience for millions of users.