Technology

Amazon acquires Shopify competitor Selz

Amazon has quietly acquired Selz, an Australian-based e-commerce platform that helps companies build online shops and add online payment options to existing websites.

Selz CEO and founder Martin Rushe originally announced the acquisition in blog post last month.

“We have signed an agreement to be acquired by Amazon and are looking forward to working with them as we continue to build easy-to-use tools for entrepreneurs,” Rushe wrote in the post.

“Nothing is changing for our customers at this time, and we’ll be in touch with customers as and when we have further updates,” he added.

Amazon confirmed the acquisition to The Hill but did not provide any details regarding the terms.

Bloomberg News noted that technology news site GeekWire first reported the acquisition on Tuesday.

The acquisition of Selz would put Amazon directly in competition with Shopify, a Canadian-based company that also allows entrepreneurs to build online stores. CNBC noted that Amazon previously ran Amazon Webstore, a similar service to Shopify, but the company shut it down in 2015.

Bloomberg noted that Shopify’s shares slipped less than 1 percent on Tuesday.

Updated at 4:17 p.m.