“Headless” e-commerce solution Instant Commerce has acquired €2 million in capital via a pre-seed round that was led by firstminute Capital.
The founders of Storyblok, Wandera, Snyk and Supercell also contributed to the investment round.
Instant Commerce will use the funding “to double the team, further develop its platform and build brand awareness throughout Europe.”
Instant Commerce claims that it is “the next-gen frontend as a service platform for eCommerce companies.” The platform “enables brands to quickly build a highly functional and engaging headless webshop without the need for technical expertise or a costly development team thanks to its no-code approach.”
Instant Commerce’s platform “integrates with scores of different systems like Shopify, Storyblok, Algolia and more using APIs.”
Thanks to the headless approach (separation of the frontend and backend) brands can finally “deliver on the expectation of today’s consumers: fast-site speed, omni-channel presence, a unique shopping experience and more.” The result is a platform that “enables eCommerce companies of any size to compete with the online offering of the world’s biggest brands at the fraction of the cost and time.”
Instant Commerce has “seen the build time of a webshop drop from four months to less than a week, with costs reducing significantly.”
Since being founded at the start of 2022, Instant Commerce “has landed more than 30 major clients including Bols, ID&T, Ekster, and Yaya.”
Coen Van Hees, Founder and CEO of Instant Commerce, said:
“Consumer expectations of the functionality and services online retailers should offer has grown exponentially over the past few years. This race to make online storefronts more engaging has led to much higher costs, strained infrastructure and a severe drain on resources. For many companies it’s simply too costly to compete. This is the problem Instant Commerce solves. By making building and maintaining a headless storefront as simple and cost-effective as possible, we give power back to business owners.”
Coen Van Hees added:
“There’s a huge demand for our platform. In only four short months we’ve secured more than 30 clients including big names like Bols and ID&T. Now, with the support of Firstminute Capital and our Angel Investors we’ll be able to rapidly expand our team, platform and start preparations for entering more international markets.”
Sam Endacott at firstminute Capital, said:
“We believe the future of web development and e-commerce is headless and have had a front-row seat in this category with our investments in Storyblok and Nuxt. However, the missing link has been a software layer to co-ordinate the ecosystem of APIs from the front-end that can be used by both non-technical users and developers.”
Sam Endacott added:
“The Instant Commerce team have experienced this pain-point directly having built a highly successful e-commerce Agency before working with major global brands. Their first product – a no-code solution to help e-commerce teams go headless without technical expertise – is just the first step in what we think can be a major platform in facilitating the next wave of e-commerce growth.”
As noted in an update shared with CI, the firm was founded in 2022 by brothers Sam and Coen Van Hees and their friend Doeke Leeuwis,
Instant Commerce is “a frontend as a service solution which enables any eCommerce brand to build a high-end headless storefront.”
As Instant Commerce is ‘no code’, business owners “do not need technical expertise or a development team to build their online offering.'”
Instant Commerce’s platform seamlessly “integrates with scores of different systems like Shopify, Storyblok, Algolia and more using APIs.”