Madrona backs Spangle, a new e-commerce company led by former Bolt CEO Maju Kuruvilla

Spangle wants to shake up digital shopping.

The new startup, founded by former Bolt CEO Maju Kuruvilla, came out of stealth mode Tuesday and announced a seed investment from Seattle VC firm Madrona along with Silicon Valley firm Streamlined Ventures.

Kuruvilla is a former Amazon VP who more recently spent two years leading Bolt, a controversial e-commerce “one-click checkout” startup founded by Ryan Breslow, who stepped down in 2022. Kuruvilla, who was CTO at the time, replaced Breslow and led the company until April of last year, when he was reportedly removed by the board.

Now he’s at the helm of Spangle, which is using AI to help retailers personalize online shopping by bridging the gap between hyper-targeted marketing and more general shopping experiences that customers have when they land on a website or app.

“Spangle addresses e-commerce right from the first touch — at check-in,” Kuruvilla wrote on LinkedIn.

Here’s more from Kuruvilla via the company’s press release:

“Personalization across retail has failed to live up to its promise due to its reliance on sparse, expensive, and backward looking customer data. No single merchant has enough customer data to make accurate predictions, and customers want more than repeat purchases. Inspired by social media platforms, customers are seeking relevance and variety, and we’re delivering on these changing expectations with a next-generation native AI e-commerce platform.”

Scott Jacobsen, managing director at Madrona, said Spangle helps brands “turn advertising traffic into a high-performing channel that actually delights the customer.”

“With Spangle, brands can use the power of AI to take what they know of the user’s interests and turn around a customer experience that’s relevant and delightful,” he wrote on LinkedIn.

Kruuvilla and Spangle CTO Fei Wang, who co-founded Spangle, are based in the Seattle region, along with a handful of other employees. Wang was previously CTO at Saks OFF 5th and spent nearly 12 years at Amazon.

Karen Moon, former CEO of Trendalytics and a longtime consumer startup investor, is COO at Spangle.

TechCrunch noted that Spangle has raised $6 million to date.