As Shopify Surges, So Are the Software Startups Riding Its Coattails

Shopify’s stock has more than quadrupled since shoppers began flocking at the start of the pandemic to the online stores of the smaller merchants Shopify serves. And now investors are getting interested in business tool startups that piggyback on Shopify.

In the latest example, a small Estonian startup, Katana, has raised $11 million in Series A funding in a round led by Atomico, a London-based VC firm, an Atomico representative told The Information. Katana—which offers a service that lets direct-to-consumer brands and manufacturers monitor inventory levels and track products—provides one of the thousands of apps that plug into Shopify’s e-commerce system, extending it with functions that Shopify itself doesn’t offer.