Thrasio, one of the larger firms that has been buying up and merging third-party Amazon vendors, has reached its breaking point. According to insiders, the firm, which was valued between $5 billion and $10 billion last year, will be laying off a chunk of its workforce this week. That revelation comes as Thrasio announces a leadership change: Greg Greeley, a former president of Airbnb and a longtime Amazon executive, will join the company’s board of directors and take over as CEO in August. He will follow Carlos Cashman, one of the company’s co-founders, who will continue to serve on the board of directors of Thrasio.
The layoffs and new CEO appointment are the latest in a string of ups and downs for Thrasio in the previous six months, highlighting some of the aggregator business model’s challenges: – When Thrasio announced a $100 million raise in April 2021, co-founder Josh Silberstein — who was also co-CEO at the time with Cashman — told TechCrunch that the company was considering a public listing to raise more money for expansion, either through a traditional IPO or a SPAC; it was also hiring a new CFO to oversee the process.
Over the summer, the SPAC concept began to take shape, with Thrasio’s value possibly reaching $10 billion. But, three months after arriving, the new CFO quit; Silberstein left in September; and, by the beginning of October, the SPAC option had been postponed, apparently owing to issues that occurred during a financial audit. – Yet, by the end of the month, Thrasio had announced yet another private fundraise, this time a $1 billion investment led by Silver Lake, putting the company’s worth at $5-10 billion. — People were spreading an email last week that purportedly sought investors in the firm via a special purpose vehicle with a $2.7 billion valuation. The sender has gone silent, which is telling (meaning: it may well be a hoax). The corporation did not respond to a request for comment.
Regrettably, the layoffs are not a ruse. The business verified the rumors to TechCrunch, and we were also given an internal document outlining how they will be carried out: workers will be told by their supervisors over the next two days (Tuesday and Wednesday). The message stated that the corporation “took the decision to reduce the size of the Thrasio team,” although it did not specify how many workers would be affected. The layoffs, we hear, will be part of a larger restructure. Cashman and Thrasio president Danny Boockvar wrote in the message to staff that the firm would need to make “strategic and operational adjustments” in order to stay on track.
