11 E-commerce Startup Ideas from Techstars 2024 (from worst to best)
Here is what 12 San Francisco e-commerce entrepreneurs are working
Why this article is useful for future entrepreneurs
Stephen King, when asked how to become a good writer, simply answered:
“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut.”
The same applies to startups. To become a good entrepreneur, we have to do two things: try out a lot of startup ideas and analyze a lot of startup ideas.
The Program: Techstars Future of Ecommerce by Ebay
Techstars is one of the world most renowed accelerator.
They invest in startups for more than 15 years, and they funded companies like Uber, Sendgrid , Classpass or Twilio.
This Techstars program, partnered with eBay, is focused on startups with innovative technologies that are shaping the future of Ecommerce.
The program lasted 3 months and took place in San Francisco.
The RULES of the GAME
In this article, we will write some lines about every startup in the program. It’s mostly for fun, here are the rules :
👨🎓 I won’t analyze the team. Despite it being the most pivotal aspect of a startup. Here, I am just stating that we are not investing in the company, just having fun analyzing the business idea.
💡 I will analyze the potential of the idea as it is. Not of potential pivots in the same business area.
🎤 One phrase pitch. We will try to understand the essential value proposition just by their one-sentence pitch.
🌈 No judgment. We are just playing around and training. I am sure these start-ups are already doing great and really hope for them, they will all become unicorns 🦄
Idea #11 — AI personalized recommendations for golfers to buy the best products
Potential: ⭐⭐
Name: Golferx
🟢 Positive :
- Innovation: Chatting with AI is the future of costumer service
- Customer Persona: Easy to identify clients
🔴 Potential Problems:
- Need: Unsure if AI can tell a golfer what he wants better than himself. The product does not look that complex (E-commerce filters could do the job)
- Market Size: A niche
Idea #10— A platform to manage e-commerce data and authorizations among IT teams
Potential: ⭐⭐
Name: Onboardbase
🟢 Positive :
- Market: Cybersecurity is a big trend
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Selling Proposition: Complex product with indirect benefits, not easy to sell
Idea #9 — A marketplace for second-hand home decor from construciton builder
Potential: ⭐⭐
Name: Unbuilt
Country: USA
🟢 Positive :
- Sector: Second hand is a growing sector
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Operations: They mostly have to deal with unique products
- Acquisition Cost: CAC is generally high in B2C marketplacees
#8— A B2B marketplace of medical equipment
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐
Name: Jelt
Country: Colombia
🟢 Positive :
Customer Persona: Well-defined and easy-to-reach B2B customer persona (hospitals etc.)
🔴 Potential Problems :
Competition: Price is the main choise criterion, competing with Amazon
#7 — A platform for companies to hire creators of short videos
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐
Name: Clutch
Country: USA
🟢 Positive :
- Trending: Social Media and videos are exploding, and companies may not have the resources to scale it internally. Creator economy is booming.
- Asset light: Marketplace model, costs are decentralized
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Quality Risk: The selected creators should be able to make quality video, understanding the needs of the company
Idea #6 — AI software to learn from ads and social media content and automatically provide insights
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Name: Purposely.ai
Country: USA
🟢 Positive :
- Market: AI is exploding, everybody is making ads
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Solution Risk: Insights should be accurate
Idea #5 — A plugin to AI generate detailed product images for e-commerce and marketplace
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Name: Ecomtent
Country: USA
🟢 Positive :
- Cost reduction: Direct link to the costs, a real impact for ecommerce with lots of producrs
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Market Size and need : Sellers elaborating this kind of product are for the moment a niche
Idea #4 — AI-powered size recommendations for e-commerce
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Name: Aistetic
Country: UK
🟢 Positive :
- Real Problem — A problem that everyone experiences, with a direct link with relevant metrics for e-commerce players (returns, conversion).
- Traction — Many players doing the same are raising pre-seed money in 2023 (Fringuant: 0.5M, Kleep 1.8M, Aitaca: 0.6M)
- 🔴 Potential Problems :
- No one found a good solution, adopted by e-commerce players that works (yet?).
- UX — It’s difficult to get your body measured while shopping, on a client side (it breaks the buying flow)
🥉 Idea #3 — An integration software for second hand retailers, to automate multi-platform distribution
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Name: Oly
Country: France
🟢 Positive: - Sector: Second hand is booming - Metrics: I am positive on integration, it has a direct link with revenues
🔴 Potential Problems:
- Market Size: There are not that many second-hand platforms, nor second-hand online resellers, so far.
- Pricing: I can’t see a huge ARR for a 35$ per month solution. (maybe they shpould expand from this niche?)
🥈Idea #2 — An automatic tag system for E-commerce automatic to boost search (color, product type, …)
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Name: Okkular
Country: Australia
🟢 Positive :
- Technology: Giving a lot of flexibility to e-commerce and boosting search. Many potenail applications.
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Selling Proposal: Indirect link to value creation, therefore not easy to sell
🥇 Idea #1 — A plugin to buy ecommerce products directly by chat
Potential: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Name: Chatgenie
Country: Philippines
🟢 Positive :
- Real Problem — They tackle directly the conversion of ecommerce
- Growing Market — The more and more shopping is made with social media
🔴 Potential Problems :
- Integration — Platforms like TikTok or Instagram will surely come up with their own solution