Global direct-to-consumer e-commerce solution provider ESW is acquiring Los Angeles-based complementary e-commerce platform Scalefast to expand its capabilities and enhance speed to market for retailers and brands.

The terms of the deal have not been disclosed. ESW said the deal was subject to customary approvals and expected the transaction to close by mid-year 2022. The e-commerce company also added that Scalefast founders, chief executive Nicolas Stehle, chief technical officer Frédéric Bocquet, and chief marketing officer Olivier Schott would join the ESW senior leadership team.

In a statement, ESW said that the acquisition would further extend its market strength across apparel, beauty, personal care and luxury brands to include entertainment, gaming and electronics. Adding that Scalefast’s industry leading data analytics and speed-to-market would also facilitate turnkey localised stores, digital ‘pop up’ stores and highly targeted DTC brand campaigns. Which ESW said would “strongly complement” its cross-border DTC solutions and market-leading end-to-end customer experience.

Tommy Kelly, founder and chief executive at ESW, said: “ESW’s acquisition of Scalefast demonstrates our commitment and ambition to accelerate growth for our customers by empowering them to be at the forefront of rapidly evolving consumer requirements around the world.

“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.”

ESW added that the complementary solutions across both technology platforms is expected “to drive accelerated growth in revenue and in product innovation across the group’s integrated client base,” serving customers in more than 200 markets.

Scalefast builds ecommerce stores “faster than any of its competitors, leveraging its feature-rich, in-house developed platform, retail infrastructure and applying proprietary data and behavioural analytics to deliver pre-built DTC ecommerce features and capabilities brands need to succeed,” states ESW. While in turn, it will provide Scalefast’s clients with its checkout, payment gateway, and logistics offerings, “which include hub or hubless options, omni-channel solutions such as ship from store, and an ecosystem of global logistics partners that move hundreds of millions of packages each year on behalf of its clients”.

Nicolas Stehle, chief executive at Scalefast, added: “Scalefast’s services are highly synergistic with ESW’s from a revenue generation perspective. 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.”