The Retail Times is a weekly newsletter covering retail tech news from Canada and around the globe.
Subscribe to R|T using this form to ensure you don’t miss out on the most important retail tech news every week!
Lightspeed founder Dax Dasilva returns as interim CEO, replacing JP Chauvet
Two years after stepping down, Lightspeed Commerce founder Dax Dasilva is now back at the firm’s helm as interim CEO following the recent crash of its stock.
This leadership shakeup comes a week after Lightspeed posted its fiscal third-quarter 2024 earnings, which despite surpassing the firm’s prior revenue and loss-cutting forecasts, failed to impress investors. The company’s shares have fallen over 25 percent since then as of publication time.
(BetaKit)
POWERED BY: TORONTO METROPOLITAN UNIVESITY
Discover the resources and communities available to you in Toronto’s tech ecosystem!
Whether you’re looking for an incubator to grow your AI startup or interested in building a career in entrepreneurship, we welcome you to join our Innovation Open House.
This is your chance to interact with Toronto Metropolitan University’s vibrant startup incubators and discover how TMU’s Master of Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship program can help you accelerate your career.
Nightmare on Wall Street: A Lyft typo projected profit to be 10x better than it really is.
On Tuesday, Lyft reported results and included a surprisingly bullish forecast. A closely watched profit margin should expand by about 500 basis points in 2024.
This is based on adjusted EBITDA, which strips out a bunch of costs. But still, investors were paying close attention, and the stock surged more than 60% in after-hours trading.
The problem is that this was a typo. Let’s call it an uber-typo.
Shopify beats Q4 estimates with strong holiday season, but stock still drops
Canadian e-commerce giant Shopify posted fourth-quarter sales and profit that narrowly surpassed analyst forecasts as the company saw a strong holiday season.
Shopify generated $2.14 billion USD in revenue in Q4 2023, a 25 percent year-over-year increase that translates to 30 percent when accounting for the sale of Shopify’s logistics business.
But despite beating forecasts, the price of Shopify’s shares fell.
(BetaKit)
Restaurant-Software Firm Toast to Cut 550 Workers
Toast Inc., a restaurant-focused software company, will cut about 550 employees, adding to the spate of technology industry workforce reductions since the start of 2024.
The job cuts are designed to promote “operating expense efficiency,” the company said Thursday in its fourth-quarter earnings statement. Toast generated 2023 annual revenue of $3.87 billion, a 42% increase from a year earlier.
Supply chain software company Nulogy receives strategic backing from US private equity firm Rubicon
Toronto-based Nulogy has secured a major strategic investment from Colorado-headquartered Rubicon Technology Partners to ramp up the expansion of its supply chain collaboration platform.
Nulogy declined to disclose the size of the investment, however, according to a November statement from Rubicon announcing its fund close, the firm typically invests $50 million to $350 million per company.
Nulogy offers a collaboration software platform for suppliers, manufacturers, and distributors, aiming to bring more transparency and visibility to supply chains.
(BetaKit)
WeCook among the latest #CDNtech companies making changes at the top
Ready-to-eat home-delivered meals company WeCook joined the unprecedented wave of executive turnover in 2024, with the company appointing COO Michel Gagné to serve as president and CEO on February 1, shifting its co-founder and now-former CEO Étienne Plourde to vice chairman of the board.
(BetaKit)
Why this Canadian VC strongly recommends SR&ED financing to his portfolio companies
In a funding landscape growing increasingly challenging for tech startups, the quest for capital has led many to explore alternatives to traditional equity investment, such as government tax incentives and grants.
While it’s a common belief that chasing this type of funding can be a time-intensive distraction for founders, Jason Robertson, co-founder and partner of Nimbus Synergies, an early-stage, healthtech-focused venture capital firm headquartered in Vancouver, has a different perspective.
(BetaKit)
Instacart to lay off 250 employees, or about 7% of the company, as part of restructuring
Instacart on Tuesday announced it would lay off about 250 employees, or roughly 7% of the company, alongside reporting fourth-quarter earnings that fell roughly in line with analysts’ estimates.
The layoffs are focused in part on middle management and creating a flatter organizational structure, according to Instacart, as well as focusing teams on larger projects. Instacart’s COO, CTO and chief architect are departing the company for personal reasons, and the company only plans to backfill the CTO role.
(CNBC)
Visa Canada, Plug and Play host Toronto FinTech Innovation Showcase to spotlight Canadian startup ecosystem
Earlier this month in Toronto, leaders from across Canada’s financial sector convened at the Plug and Play Toronto FinTech Innovation Showcase to highlight the tech set to transform Canada’s financial services ecosystem.
The event looked to explore opportunities for collaboration among members of the Canadian financial services community, to spotlight leading companies, and to discuss how Canada can accelerate the momentum of its FinTech sector.
(BetaKit)
In the wake of Buy Now, Pay Later, we could be getting Dine Now, Pay Later
First we got Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL). Soon, we should be getting Dine Now, Pay Later.
A report released late last year indicated that almost half of U.S. consumers said they used BNPL options to buy meals at restaurants. In Canada, restaurant owners and upper management have a “strong desire to add buy now, pay later and plan to do it in the next year.”
Innovation in payments is not new. It’s a constant. But some consumers might be able to take advantage of new modes of payment while others will end up being taken advantage of.
Professor Esma Aïmeur discusses the double-edged sword of GenAI ahead of the World AI Cannes Festival
Esma Aïmeur, a professor at the computer science department of Université de Montréal (Canada), focuses her academic body of work on how humans interact with and are impacted by AI.
Speaking with BetaKit ahead of her talk at the World AI Cannes Festival (WAICF), Aïmeur shared more about the explosive power of GenAI and why she calls it a double-edged sword.
(BetaKit)
Uber, Lyft drivers strike across US, demanding fairer pay
Drivers for Uber, Lyft, delivery workers for DoorDash, were staging a strike on Wednesday, seeking fair pay and better treatment.
“These platforms continuously decrease driver earnings year after year as means to show they are profitable to investors to get them to buy into their stock,” said Shantwan Humphrey, a driver in Dallas, Texas.
(Reuters)
