eBay Enterprise merges with Innotrac to become ecommerce operations giant Radial

The eBay Enterprise brand is dead, as the former eBay-owned unit officially merges with Innotrac to become Radial.

Though eBay is better known for its ecommerce site, the company has also offered enterprise-focused services for some time — eBay Enterprise specialized in developing and managing ecommerce sites for retailers. As part of its big divestment diet last year — which also saw eBay spin out PayPal as a standalone entity — the Internet giant offloaded eBay Enterprise to an investment consortium that included U.S.-based ecommerce fulfillment company Innotrac. The $925 million deal was finalized in November.

Now eBay Enterprise and Innotrac are jumping into bed together under a completely new brand, as they look to “prepare ecommerce for the new retail reality,” according to a press release. In summary, this means Radial is hoping to cement its position as an omnichannel technology and operations provider for ecommerce companies — covering digital and physical stores, order management, analytics, order routing, order and inventory management, payments, and customer service. The company currently counts DSW, GameStop, Shoe Carnival, and Destination XL as clients.

“Despite allocating significant resources to omnichannel, many retailers have not evolved fast enough to keep pace with their customers’ demands and expectations,” said Tobias Hartmann, president of Radial. “Radial empowers brands to take down the ‘walls’ between their physical and digital stores, giving them an advantage to acquiring and retaining customers by delivering the type of personalized experiences that keep them coming back for more.”

Ultimately, it’s all about giving ecommerce companies a single entry point for solving their sales headaches — rather than working with multiple firms for different parts of their business, the omnichannel approach lets them work with a single company to ensure the end customer can receive and return products with minimal friction.

“The world of ecommerce has evolved at an incredibly rapid rate over the last several years,” said Todd Miller, principal at private equity firm Sterling Partners, which was part of the consortium that bought eBay Enterprise. “It will only continue to grow exponentially more complex, with mobile playing an increasingly dominant role in this transformation. We’ve seen today’s retailers struggle with omnichannel, and as a result their profits and customer loyalty have suffered. In order for merchants to not just survive – but thrive – they must dynamically connect their entire supply chains to efficiently meet consumer demand. Omnichannel solutions are the key to unlocking this potential.”

It’s also worth noting here that this deal will create something of a giant in the ecommerce operations space — Hartmann had previously confirmed that a new firm would be created as a result of the eBay Enterprise acquisition, encompassing 7,500 employees and 27 distribution centers around the world.