A major ShipBob European expansion of 20 fulfilment centres has been announced, as the firm looks to uncover the next unicorn consumer brands in the UK and capitalise on the continued ecommerce surge.
ShipBob, which raised a $200m Series E round in June 2021 and includes the likes of Bain Capital Ventures and SoftBank among its investors, helps small and medium-sized brands offer an Amazon Prime-like experience by providing rapid and cost-effective deliveries. The firm grew over 100% year-over-year in 2020, shipped billions in gross merchandise value, and is currently valued at more than $1bn thanks to its track record in helping Shopify-era entrepreneurs scale their brands into thriving businesses by outsourcing all fulfilment, leaving them to focus on growth. Through ShipBob’s UK fulfilment centres, they offer brands instant access to ready-made international networks whilst utilising its own technology to help brands track inventory, fulfil orders and identify the best carriers to deliver stock quickly and affordably.
UK brands are set to benefit first from the ShipBob European expansion. Alongside enhancing domestic deliveries, partnering with ShipBob will offer British brands instant access to consumers across the North American market and the ability to ship to US shoppers within days. ShipBob will also provide brands with peace of mind against supply chain challenges by offering instant access to its network of popular national and international carrier partners, ensuring that products can always be delivered to a consumer’s door.
The company has appointed Enda Breslin as EMEA General Manager. To kickstart the ShipBob European expansion, Enda’s first focus will be in building the company’s UK operations to at least 5 ecommerce fulfilment centres in 2022. By 2023, the company intends to have 20 fulfilment centres across Europe and create 300 permanent jobs in the UK and another 200 across Europe.
Enda has 30 years’ experience in European ecommerce, most recently as Chief Commercial Officer of European ecommerce firm Radial. He also founded Europe’s first ecommerce SaaS platform, Aspherio, and launched GSI Commerce/eBay Enterprise in Europe.
“This investment is a vote of confidence in the UK economy. I know our nation of creators and entrepreneurs will relish the prospect of easier access to customers abroad, helping them to export, grow and create more jobs along the way.”
– Paul Scully, Business Minister
“The UK is one of the most sophisticated ecommerce landscapes in the world with 45% of UK retail happening online during the pandemic. This trend looks set to continue but recent weeks have shown how supply chain flaws can bring growth to a standstill, and we want to remove this risk for these up and coming companies. ShipBob is focused on giving every brand the opportunity to sell cross-border and is the only player in global ecommerce that has the right balance between technology, operations and customer focus, with the ambition and agility to be number one in any market that we decide to enter.”
– Enda Breslin, EMEA General Manager, ShipBob
“We launched ShipBob to democratise fulfilment and give the world’s emerging brands the scalable sales and delivery capabilities of enormous multinational companies. Expanding into Europe will help us hand these powers to a vast number of new challenger businesses and I can’t think of anyone better placed than Enda to lead this charge. We’ve been working closely together in our London office over the last few weeks to welcome our first ten UK employees and I’m certain his guidance will help ShipBob rapidly scale across Europe from this initial UK foothold.”
– Dhruv Saxena, co-founder and CEO, ShipBob
