A Strong Start to the Year Driven by AI and About You
The start of the year is ending on a positive note for Zalando. The German e-commerce company’s performance is driven by the strategic use of artificial intelligence and the contribution of About You, which was integrated into the group about a year and a half ago. During the first three months of the fiscal year, Zalando’s revenue surged 23.8% on a reported basis, reaching €3 billion—a trend that corresponds to organic (pro forma) growth—excluding the impact of the acquisition—of 3.4%. At the same time, gross merchandise volume (GMV) is also on the rise, growing by 6% organically and 21.7% on a reported basis.
The profitability picture is also positive. For this quarter, adjusted EBIT climbed to €65 million, up 38.7% year-over-year, with the group’s adjusted EBIT margin improving from 1.9% to 2.2%. This result was boosted by €10 million in synergies from the About You acquisition—net of integration costs, the company notes—and is in line with the goal of reaching €40 million for the current year 2026.
Strong performance in B2C and B2B
On the distribution channel front, the number of active B2C customers reached a “new record” of 62.3 million, with average spending per customer up 2.9% to €305. As for the B2B segment—where Zalando partners with other businesses by offering them access to its platform, logistics, and technology infrastructure to help them sell their products across Europe —reported sales rose by 23.6% to €297 million. Adjusted EBIT climbed to €26 million, and the adjusted EBIT margin increased to 8.6%.
Despite “a weak geopolitical and macroeconomic environment”—terms used without hesitation by management—since early March, the group has nevertheless confirmed its forecasts for the full 2026 fiscal year. It expects GMV and revenue growth of between 12% and 17% on a reported basis, and adjusted EBIT of between €660 million and €740 million. However, this forecast did not fully reassure the market, which was spooked by the volatility of the global environment, leading to a drop of nearly two percentage points in Zalando’s stock that morning.
The Dublin tech hub at the heart of the strategy
Meanwhile, the group is investing increasingly in artificial intelligence as a strategic resource to continue growing in a changing world. Online shopping has undergone a significant transformation in recent years, becoming increasingly competitive as it moved from the post-COVID boom to a perhaps natural normalization, and on to a new phase of necessary restructuring. At the center of this strategy is the Dublin tech hub, which is celebrating its eleventh anniversary and preparing to enter an increasingly crucial new phase of its operations, particularly in light of the major role the city will play in the near future.
Indeed, with Ireland set to assume the presidency of the Council of the European Union starting in June, Dublin is poised to become one of the nerve centers of European technology policy. It is precisely in this context that Zalando’s tech hub in the Irish capital is celebrating its anniversary—a space that, over time, has taken on an increasingly operational role in the platform’s development.
Opened in 2015, even before the group’s launch in the Irish market, the site began as a center dedicated to data analysis but has gradually evolved into a full-fledged engineering and technology hub. It now has around 100 employees and works on large-scale products and services, with a growing focus on artificial intelligence and machine learning. Among the tools currently being refined is the “Zalando Assistant,” which relies on the deployment of advanced robots within the logistics network and the use of generative AI to accelerate the process of listing products online.
“At its core, Zalando is a technology company, and we approached e-commerce as engineers from day one,” said co-CEO Robert Gentz. “When we were looking for a place to expand our technological capabilities in Europe in 2015, Dublin was a natural choice.”
Over time, the hub’s role has expanded: from big data research to managing the entire product development cycle, and on to the transition to “mobile-first” architectures and microservices systems. Some features now integrated into the platform, such as personalization tools and solutions based on generative AI, were developed specifically at the Irish site.
European Innovation in the Face of E-commerce Standardization
Founded in Berlin in 2008 by Gentz and David Schneider, Zalando has grown to serve over 60 million customers and partner with more than 7,000 brands across Europe. “Today, this platform is our main strength,” added Gentz. “For customers, we’ve created apps where discovering and buying their favorite brands is a personalized and reliable experience.”
The expansion of its presence in Dublin is part of a broader trend in the evolution of fashion e-commerce. A trend that also reflects the phase currently being experienced by luxury multi-brand e-commerce retailers, who are grappling with the normalization of consumption, changing shopping habits, rising prices, the impact of tariffs, and logistical challenges. A combination of factors that, at this stage, seems to be shifting the focus back to brick-and-mortar retail.
Mario Ortelli, managing partner of OrtelliCo., confirmed this: “While there was no competition when physical stores were closed, digital must now necessarily offer advantages and an engaging shopping experience: a wide selection, attractive prices, and ease of use. ” In this scenario, strengthening the technological component thus becomes a strategic—and necessary—lever for players navigating the digital landscape. This is also why Zalando continues to invest in its Irish hub, supported by its collaboration with IDA Ireland, the government agency responsible for attracting investment, which has supported the group’s research and development activities. In this regard, its chairman, Donal Travers, emphasized that this synergy marked “a new chapter in their journey of innovation and AI development to generate crucial business insights, thereby making Ireland a prime location for leading European technology companies.”
Looking at the European landscape, Gentz highlighted the issue of competitiveness: “Our success is built on European diversity and innovation, but the environment that allowed us to grow is losing momentum. To continue building companies like Zalando, we need stronger incentives, better access to capital, and smarter regulation.”
Dublin’s positioning—set to strengthen further on an institutional level in the coming months—is thus intertwined with Zalando’s own evolution, as the company is poised to compete in a rapidly transforming digital market that is becoming increasingly mature and competitive.