Firmly's One Integration Links Merchants to AI Channels

Online retailers without large engineering teams can reach AI shopping assistants through one connection instead of building separate integrations.

Updated on Nov. 5, 2026 in Business Strategy

Wide photograph of a single shipping container in a rain-wet yard with one cable fanning into thin fiber lines across the ground toward distant doorways. — Seattle startup Firmly raised $15 million in a Series A led by Squarepoint Capital to let merchants reach AI shopping assistants through one connection. AI Illustration. Upload story photo >

Live Poll

Do you think AI shopping assistants are making your online shopping better?

Seattle startup Firmly raised $15 million in a Series A led by Squarepoint Capital and launched Ask Agent, a conversational shopping tool that can be added to merchant websites. The funding lets merchants connect to AI shopping channels without writing code, which matters for retailers weighing how to reach customers through AI assistants.

Why it matters

Every AI assistant, marketplace, social platform and agent framework asks stores what they sell and how to buy it in its own way, and most merchants lack the engineering staff to integrate with each new channel. Firmly's model tries to close that gap with one standardized connection that the merchant can maintain.

Firmly reports a $15 million Series A and about $20 million raised in total, with Firmly Connect reaching more than 11 million merchants and $900 billion in gross merchandise volume. Early Ask Agent deployments show conversion rate improvements of up to 18% and average order value increases of up to 23%, though these are company-reported early results.

The players

Firmly

A Seattle startup that connects merchants to AI shopping channels through a standardized integration layer, with a platform reaching more than 11 million merchants.

Squarepoint Capital

An investment firm that led Firmly's $15 million Series A round.

Mastercard

A global payments network that named Firmly a partner when it launched Agent Connect in September.

The details

Firmly Connect plugs into a merchant's existing commerce infrastructure and presents the catalog, product pages and checkout to every destination through one standardized connection. Destinations integrate with Firmly once to reach every merchant on the platform, so a merchant does not need separate builds for each AI channel. The merchant remains merchant of record on every order, and Ask Agent can be added to a merchant website with a single line of JavaScript.

Mastercard launched Agent Connect in September and named Firmly a partner.
Firmly announced the $15 million Series A and launched Ask Agent on November 5, 2026.
Analysts expect AI-driven traffic to U.S. retail sites to grow 130% this holiday season.

Market Landscape

Firmly is positioned as merchant-side infrastructure alongside Mastercard's Agent Connect, which launched in September and named Firmly a partner. J.P. Morgan Payments and Samsung NEXT also joined the Series A as strategic investors, signaling that payments and device players are backing the layer that connects stores to AI shopping channels.

Retailers should evaluate whether AI shopping channels are a near-term source of traffic and assess what it would cost to integrate with each one individually versus through a shared connection. Operators in e-commerce should also track conversion and average order value on any AI-driven channel, since the reported gains are early and company-reported.

The takeaway

The operating question is whether one standardized connection can replace separate integrations for each AI channel, so an e-commerce operator should compare that cost against their current engineering capacity. Track conversion and order value on any AI-driven channel over the holiday season, because the reported gains are early results rather than verified outcomes.