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aVenture is in Alpha: aVenture recently launched early public access to our research product. It's intended to illustrate capabilities and gather feedback from users. While in Alpha, you should expect the research data to be limited and may not yet meet our exacting standards. We've made the decision to temporarily present this information to showcase the product's potential, but you should not yet rely upon it for your investment decisions.
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From TechCrunch
By Ivan Mehta
June 7, 2024
Shopify has acquired Threads.com, the Seqiuoa-backed Slack alternative, Threads said on its website. The companies didn’t disclose the terms of the deal but said that the Threads.com team will join Shopify.
Threads added that after the launch of Meta’s social network with the same name last year, the startup had “the opportunity to sell our domains.” It is not clear if the startup sold the domain name to Meta, Shopify, or anyone else, but the note does indicate that it would have had to rebrand from Threads had it remained independent. We have reached out to all these companies, and we’ll update the story if we hear back.
Threads.com launched its product from stealth in 2019 with $10.5 million in funding. It was thrown into the limelight after Meta launched Threads, its Twitter-like social network. Notably, Meta also had another product named Threads, an Instagram companion app that started in 2019 and was shut down in 2021.
Threads.com’s team said that while Meta’s social network was on the rise, a few companies approached the startup to acquire it. Eventually, it chose Shopify, it said, for the opportunity “to tinker at scale”.
“Around the same time [when Threads.com was considering selling the domain], a handful of companies approached us, wondering if we would be open to an acquisition. When this happened in the past, we would politely decline. However, this time, things were different,” the company said in the post. “We weren’t that excited about the time it would take to invest in a rebrand, and with mind-warping technological advances now being a commodity, we were excited about joining a place where we could tinker at scale.”
Last year, Meta opted to use Threads.net because Threads, the business communication startup, already owned Threads.com. However, many customers still visited the .com website and even downloaded the startup’s app before realizing it wasn’t the social network they were looking for.
According to data from analytics firm data.ai at the time, Threads.com’s app saw 880,000 downloads globally on iOS alone between July 6 and July 12. And on Android the app crossed the mark of a million lifetime downloads with just a few downloads prior to Meta launching its Threads social network.
“Threads is a powerful word and an internet native term,” Threads co-founder and CEO Rousseau Kazi, who worked at Facebook for six years, said in a statement issued to TechCrunch last year.
“Using threads — on various platforms — is the best way to stay connected with your [.net]work or [.com]pany. Given this, it comes as no surprise that Meta chose a powerful label to represent their take at building the town square.”
Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke welcomed Kazi and his team but didn’t expand on how it plans to integrate the product within Shopify.
After Shopify bought his last startup, Birk Jernström wants to help developers build one-person unicorns
Sam Altman and “his tech CEO friends” have a betting pool on the year we will see the first one-person billion-dollar company. The idea of a single person reaching a billion-dollar valuation for a startup would have been unthinkable without AI. But single-person, AI-first businesses have been sprouting all over the tech industry and Birk Jernström, CEO of Polar, a “monetization platform to empower one-person unicorns,” is standing by to help them get there. Polar hopes to stand out from other
Jun 18, 2025
A comprehensive list of 2025 tech layoffs
The tech layoff wave is still kicking in 2025. Last year saw more than 150,000 job cuts across 549 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. So far this year, more than 22,000 workers have been the victim of reductions across the tech industry, with a staggering 16,084 cuts taking place in February alone. We’re tracking layoffs in the tech industry in 2025 so you can see the trajectory of the cutbacks and understand the impact on innovation across all types of companies.
Jun 17, 2025
Unlock purpose-driven growth at TechCrunch All Stage, and get $210 off for 6 more days
T-minus 6 days until TechCrunch All Stage ticket prices rise. From now until June 22 at 11:59 p.m. PT, founders save $210 and investors save $200 on passes. Are you ready to push your startup to the next level? Or are you an investor looking to back the next big breakthrough? Join TC All Stage on July 15 at SoWa Power Station in Boston for the founder summit built for traction and breakout growth. Give your startup a competitive edge. Secure your pass now and save up to $210. Why attend TC All
Jun 17, 2025