Google launched new shopping experiences on AI Mode with over 50 billion product listings from global retailers and mom and pop stores
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Dado Ruvic
As Google makes public its ambitions to be a shopping concierge with its new AI mode, the move is set to disrupt the businesses of retail SaaS firms building basic storefronts, comparison tools, plug-and-play checkout layers, and AR/VR tools, among others. Further, if your start-up helps D2C brands get discovered in search, Google can now do it as part of their AI mode itself.
Google, at its recent event, launched new shopping experiences on AI Mode with over 50 billion product listings from global retailers and mom and pop stores. With reviews, prices, colour options and availability, a virtual try-on mode, and a new agentic checkout experience all incorporated in this mode, one can complete their shopping on Google itself. While this is set to launch in the US, it’s a feature Google aims to expand globally.
This way, impulse buys can now happen via search page and will also most likely feature products fitting your history. Google however will have no control over merchant pricing.
‘Validation and competition’
“In India specifically, where retail is a blend of discovery, trust, and low-friction payment, this could hit marketplaces and mid-sized D2C aggregators more than pure SaaS,” Sunil Nair, co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, Mela Platforms, said. “For retail tech start-ups, especially those building storefront infrastructure or virtual try-ons and recommendation engines, it’s both validation and competition,” he adds. Start-ups will now need to reassess how defensible they are, he said.
In the US, Bloomreach, Marketo, DressX and Zeekit (acquired by Walmart) are a few companies offering these services. Some Indian players in this space include Scapic (acquired by Flipkart), Fynd (omni channel and storefront tech), Tagalys (AI-based merchandising and product discovery), Vue.ai (acquired by M2P Fintech), and GoKwik (checkout optimisation and conversions) among others. There are also early-stage AI start-ups in the 3D catalogues and virtual try-on space.
Spotlight on AI
Greyhound Research says Google’s move signals a pivot toward “ambient commerce,” where AI isn’t just an add-on but the layer through which all online shopping happens. “We believe this move will accelerate feature commoditisation across niche AR and storefront start-ups, forcing them to either integrate, specialise, or risk obsolescence,” Sanchit Vir Gogia, chief analyst & CEO, Greyhound Research, said. Both vertical SaaS vendors and social discovery platforms could be impacted, he added. For instance, Instagram may face pressure as user attention migrates to multimodal environments, he notes.
Ashwini Asokan, co-founder of AI start-up Mad Street Den (the company behind Vue.ai), says SaaS tools will “be invalid” overnight. “Google will just distribute most of their tools freely in early stages as part of GCP (Google Cloud Platform) commits. There will be few definitive winners but most of it will get consolidated or eaten up by the cloud guys,” she said. She adds that earlier, enterprise customers would pick vertical optimised platforms because of accuracy and quality, but now that has changed with Gen AI. MSD has recently been acquired by M2P Fintech.
However, the situation isn’t entirely bleak.
Amazon, Flipkart, Meesho and other marketplaces have already woven AI across their search, product catalogue, checkout, and logistics segments through in-house tech and acquisitions. They also have the advantage of customer habits and price differences.
But, Gogia warns that brands must now treat AI “as a central operating system” to reduce business risk.
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Published on May 25, 2025
