Shopify has made a significant acquisition by acquiring Threads.com, a Sequoia-backed Slack alternative, as announced by Threads on its website. While the terms of the deal were not disclosed, it was revealed that the Threads.com team will be joining Shopify.
Threads.com, which launched its product from stealth in 2019 with $10.5 million in funding, gained attention after Meta launched a social network with the same name. The startup had the opportunity to sell its domain names, and ultimately chose Shopify as the buyer. This decision was influenced by the desire to avoid the time and effort required for a rebrand and to have the opportunity to innovate at scale within Shopify.
Last year, Meta had to use Threads.net instead of Threads.com due to the latter being owned by the business communication startup. Despite this, Threads.com’s app saw significant downloads globally, indicating a strong interest in the brand.
Threads co-founder and CEO Rousseau Kazi, who previously worked at Facebook, emphasized the power of the term “threads” in connecting people online. Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke welcomed Kazi and his team, but details on how the product will be integrated into Shopify were not provided.
The acquisition of Threads.com by Shopify marks a strategic move in the tech industry, with potential implications for both companies and their users.