Shopify

Overview

Shopify Inc. is a Canadian multinational ecommerce company headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario. The company develops and operates a commerce platform, together with a set of related services, that businesses use to sell products online and through other channels. Merchants using the platform can set up an online store, list and organize their products, accept payments, and manage the shipping of orders.

Shopify is a publicly traded company. Its shares are listed on both the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol SHOP. As a multinational business, the company serves merchants outside of Canada in addition to those in its home market.

History

Shopify was founded in 2006 by Tobias Lutke, Daniel Weinand, and Scott Lake. The company was established in Ottawa, Ontario, which has remained its headquarters. From its founding, Shopify's focus has been on providing software that allows merchants to create and operate their own online stores rather than selling goods directly itself.

Over the years following its founding, the company expanded from a hosted online store product into a broader commerce platform covering additional aspects of running a retail business, including payments and shipping, and grew into a multinational operation. It later became a public company, with its shares trading on major exchanges in both Canada and the United States.

Platform

The Shopify platform is offered to merchants as a set of hosted commerce tools. Its principal capabilities include:

• Online stores — Merchants can set up and run a storefront on the web without building and hosting the underlying ecommerce software themselves.
• Multi-channel selling — The platform is designed to let merchants sell across multiple sales channels rather than through a single storefront alone.
• Product management — Merchants can create, organize, and maintain the catalog of products they offer for sale.
• Payments — The platform includes functionality for accepting and managing payments from customers.
• Shipping — Tools are provided for handling the shipping side of order fulfillment.

In addition to the core platform, Shopify provides associated services intended to support merchants in operating their businesses. Because the platform is delivered as a hosted service, the technical operation of the underlying software is handled by Shopify rather than by the individual merchant.

Corporate Information

Shopify's corporate headquarters are located in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The company operates internationally and is classified within the ecommerce industry. Further information about the company and its products is published on its official website.