AI transforms OnBuy from £1m monthly loss to £20m gross profit following £150m in sales

Business estimates AI has saved 25 years of development time and tens of millions of pounds, fast-tracking growth and enabling challenger brand to compete with global retail giants

LONDON, Feb. 25, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Artificial Intelligence has transformed OnBuy.com from losing £1 million per month to delivering approaching £20 million gross profit in the last 12 months. The announcement comes after a record breaking year, which saw over £150 million worth of sales through the online retail platform.

Since 2016 OnBuy has disrupted e-commerce with a revolutionary cashback offering, but early strategic decisions to implement industry leading AI have played a pivotal role in its meteoric growth over the last year.

The company, which spends over £100,000 a year on AI, estimates that the technology has saved the business up to 25 years in development time and tens of millions of pounds of costs.

Cas Paton, CEO and Founder at OnBuy, said: "Becoming an AI-driven business has enabled us to scale further and faster than many thought possible. Without AI, it may have taken decades for us to achieve our current position competing with established global retail platforms. The increased competition our platform is providing is good news for sellers and consumers alike."

The world's first cashback marketplace - which has just been named in the 2025 Sunday Times 100 Tech list of Britain's fastest-growing private technology companies - is now using AI across the entire company for operational efficiency, enhancing both customer and retail experiences, and driving customer loyalty and retention. The technology business is also using AI to reduce fraud risk, help retailers improve sales performance and expediate the company's international rollout across the EU and USA.

Paton added: "AI has democratised the tech landscape and enabled ambitious challenger brands like ours to compete on a global scale at a speed that simply wouldn't have been possible 20 years ago. It has also allowed us to free up resource to focus on further developing our pioneering cashback offering, maximising value for over 6 million of our customers.

"We haven't even scratched the surface of what AI can achieve for our business, and we have a number of game-changing AI-fuelled projects in development that will fuel rapid future growth."

OnBuy is planning to deliver a number of additional AI-driven features in the coming months, including autocategorisation, which will revolutionise how retailers list products on the platform. Sentiment analysis, cross-selling, and automatic language detection are also in development, which will improve functionality as the business expands its presence around the world.

To further fuel its international growth this year the company took the strategic decision to move its HQ from Bournemouth to London and launch a permanent base in New York. The move is designed to enable the challenger to attract the best tech talent from around the world as it grows its headcount by 30% in 2025.

About OnBuy

With over 6 million customers, OnBuy is the largest UK marketplace and the first in the world to offer instant cashback on every product across its site.

The company's vision is clear: to support sellers and provide the best value directly to customers. As a pure online marketplace that does not stock its own inventory, the platform sets itself apart by partnering with retailers, rather than competing against them. This unique approach has enabled OnBuy to revolutionise cashback rewards in the online marketplace to deliver tangible cumulative value for customers, whilst offering simple fees and clear policies for sellers, as well as the continuous advice and support they require in order to succeed.
www.onbuy.com

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