Whatnot Acquires Shaped, Adding Real-Time Recommendation Technology

Whatnot announced on Wednesday that it has acquired Shaped, ending the machine-learning startup’s independent operation. TechCrunch reported that the purchase aims to strengthen Whatnot’s discovery and personalization features on its livestream shopping platform. Emmanuel Fuentes, Whatnot’s VP of Data and AI, said the combination will allow faster and more responsive recommendations.

He noted that live commerce presents unique challenges because inventory changes by the second, shows start and end continuously, and buyer intent shifts throughout each broadcast. Fuentes added that Whatnot has already cut recommendation latency from roughly a day to minutes over the past six years, and the acquisition is expected to move performance closer to real time.

Whatnot’s systems currently process more than 500,000 hours of live video and millions of real-time interactions each week.

Shaped was founded to help businesses build AI-powered recommendation systems that combine customer data with large language models and machine learning. Its customers have included Outdoorsy and QVC. As part of the transaction, Shaped founder and CEO Tullie Murrell will join Whatnot along with nearly a dozen engineers and AI researchers.

Murrell, who previously worked at Meta, will lead Whatnot’s new Applied AI Research group. The acquisition occurs amid rapid expansion at Whatnot. The company, launched in 2019, said its sellers have completed more than 1 billion orders.

Earlier this year Whatnot raised $225 million in a Series F round that valued the firm at more than $11 billion. It added 20 million buyers over the past year and introduced more than 35 new categories in 2024 plus more than 45 additional categories in the first half of 2025.