Lyst, a fashion marketplace once valued at $700M, sells to Japan’s Zozo for $154M

Fashion goes in and out of style, and it turns out, so do fashion startups. Lyst, a high-end fashion marketplace that was once valued at $700 million, has been acquired for just $154 million in cash by Zozo, a Japan-based fashion and e-commerce business. Zozo owns a number of fashion brands that include Wear by Zozo, Zozotown and Zozosuit, among others. You might have heard of Zozo for another reason, though: Its founder Yusaku Maezawa once had the “most retweeted tweet,” when he promised to give away 100 million yen in cash for retweeting it. Zozo said it will continue to operate U.K.-based Lyst as a standalone business, and its current CEO Emma McFerran is staying with the company. It goes without saying that Lyst sold for a price tag massively lower than its last valuation, but it’s a sign of the times: The world of e-commerce is facing spectacular levels of uncertainty, and Lyst itself was dealing with headwinds from three different directions. First, U.S. tariff hikes are rais ... Read full article.