Inside Ecommerce

For December 30, 2023

Today's top e-commerce stories include:

Apple was authorized to continue selling smartwatches in the U.S.
Amazon will start rolling out ads on Amazon Prime Video.
2023 holiday sales came in at the lower end of NRF expectations

Enjoy!

A U.S. court authorized Apple to resume sales of its latest smartwatches. The temporary ruling comes after the company was banned from importing the watches after violating the intellectual property of medical device maker Masimo.

More:

The International Trade Commission (ITC) banned Apple from importing its Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 models in October, and the ruling took effect on Dec. 25.
The company stopped selling the watches online and in stores last week.
Apple appealed the ITC ruling and requested an emergency stay from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.
The court temporarily allowed Apple to continue selling its watches and told the ITC to address Apple's request for a longer stay by Jan. 10.
Apple resumed online and in-store sales of its watches yesterday.

Amazon Prime Video will start displaying ads in the U.S. on Jan. 29. Subscribers will need to pay an extra $2.99 per month to keep their video content ad-free.

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Amazon said the ads will allow it to "continue investing in compelling content."
Amazon Prime Video commercials will come to the U.K., Germany, and Canada on Feb. 5.
Ads will be rolled out in France, Italy, Spain, Mexico, and Australia later this year.
Other streamers, including Disney Plus, Hulu, Max, Netflix, and Paramount Plus, have introduced ads on their most affordable subscription plans.

U.S. retail sales rose 3.1% YoY this holiday season, according to preliminary data from Mastercard SpendingPulse. The National Retail Federation expected YoY growth between 3% and 4%.

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Online retail sales rose 6.3%, and in-store sales increased 2.2%, according to Mastercard.
Digital channels captured a greater share of retail sales this year, but in-store shopping still accounts for most spending.
Apparel sales rose 2.4% YoY, while the restaurant sector surged 7.8%.
Electronics and jewelry sales saw decreases of 0.4% and 2%, respectively.

Cart.com secured $30M from Trinity Capital to expand its operations and strengthen its balance sheet. The funding came after the Texas-based e-commerce platform was valued at $1.2B.

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The latest investment formed part of a $100M debt refinancing package from Trinity and Silicon Valley Bank.
The company was valued at $1.2B in June by a $60M Series C equity funding round.
Cart.com provides e-commerce and logistics solutions for merchants selling internationally.
About 6,000 brands currently make use of its platform.

What the numbers say: 59% of U.S. smartwatch/fitness tracker users surveyed between October 2022 and September 2023 owned a device from Apple. Fitbit came in a distant second with 27%, with Samsung third at 21%. A total greater than 100% was possible because some users owned more than one device.

Relevance: Apple is the dominant player in the U.S. smartwatch/fitness tracker market. However, the company is struggling against a patent dispute over blood oxygen-measuring technology in its latest devices. The company was forced to temporarily halt sales of its Apple Watch Ultra 2 and the Series 9 models, but the devices returned to store shelves after the tech giant won an appeal. The patent dispute between Apple and medical device maker Masimo remains ongoing.

Japan is preparing to regulate Apple and Google's app stores. The legislation is intended to prevent tech giants from shutting rivals out of their digital ecosystems.

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Japan is drafting legislation that would force Apple and Google to grant operating system access to outside app stores and payments.
The legislation is due to be sent to the country's parliament in 2024.
The regulations are intended to target app stores, payments, searches, browsers, and operating systems.
The legislation would enable the Japan Fair Trade Commission to impose fines of up to 6% of the revenue from offending activities.

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Gregory Bridgman

Writer / Editor

Gregory Bridgman is a politics and e-commerce researcher with a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. He also holds a Master of Science from University College London and a Bachelor's degree from the University of Cape Town. Feel free to follow him on Twitter or drop him an email at gregory@inside.com.