Equity Value Advisors
Commerce governance for investors, boards and brand executives.
Former Amazon executive. Four successful exits. Independent director, investor and operator focused on the commerce issues that increasingly affect enterprise value.
- Led Amazon Services
- Built Buy Box Experts to 300+ people
- $3B+ marketplace GMV supported
- Exits: Buy Box Experts, Skubana, Fakespot, The Prosper Show
Two audiences. One underlying problem.
Digital intermediaries change who controls demand, economics and the customer relationship. Start where your decisions sit.
For PE investors & boards
Is digital commerce strengthening the investment thesis?
Understand where ecommerce growth creates value, where marketplace or channel dependencies are becoming material, and whether governance will hold up through diligence.
- Ecommerce board governance
- Ecommerce due diligence
- Amazon concentration risk
- Ecommerce metrics for boards
- Agentic commerce in diligence and valuation
For brand executives
What changes when AI agents become a commerce intermediary?
Prepare the brand for software that influences discovery, comparison and purchase before the consumer reaches a brand or retailer.
- Brand control in agentic commerce
- Product data for AI agents
- Channel control and unauthorized sellers
- Marketplace governance
- Who owns the customer when an AI agent buys?
Three frameworks for the decisions that matter.
Each one turns a broad commerce risk into questions management can answer and a board can oversee.
- The Agentic Commerce Control ModelSeven dimensions for deciding what to retain, delegate and govern as AI agents mediate commerce.
- The Board Commerce Health CheckSeven questions that expose where commerce risk is becoming material.
- Agentic Commerce ReadinessAssess product truth, discovery, transactions, economics and governance before AI shopping scales.
Recent thinking
All insightsFor boards
What questions should boards ask management about agentic commerce readiness?
Boards should ask management seven questions, one for each dimension of the Agentic Commerce Control Model: whether AI systems describe the products accurately, which agents and sellers carry them, what customer data the company keeps, what agent-driven sales contribute after…
Read the answer-
For PE investors
How should private equity investors factor agentic commerce into due diligence and valuation? -
For brand executives
How does agentic commerce shift power between brands, retailers, marketplaces and AI platforms? -
For Amazon-dependent brands
Is agentic commerce a threat or an opportunity for brands that depend on Amazon?
What has to go right over the next three to five years?
For a PE-backed company, the question is whether the board has the experience and governance to challenge management effectively. For a brand preparing for agentic commerce, it is whether product data, distribution, customer access, economics and decision rights are strong enough to participate without creating unnecessary dependence.
Author of The Amazon Marketplace Dilemma and Controlling Your Brand in the Age of Amazon. Explore the books · Full biography
The Agentic Commerce Brief
A concise weekly brief for brand executives on what changed in agentic commerce and what it means for brand control and governance.
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