Fashion retailer and tech provider Zalando has said revenue was up by 23.8% in the first quarter of the year, with adjusted EBIT reaching €65m.

Part of this was due to the acquisition of German ecommerce site About You, which Zalando said contributed €10m to the EBIT rise, although it added that this was “before integration costs”. 

On a pro-forma basis, which accounts for the acquisition, revenue growth was a more modest 3.4%.

Group revenue for the quarter was just short of €3bn. Revenue from the company’s fast-growing B2B business hit €297m in the quarter, up from €240m last year. Zalando partners with both Marks & Spencer and Next for European distribution through its Zeos platform. 

“Our strong first quarter demonstrates the strength of our strategy. We are very satisfied with the progress we’re making in strategically scaling AI innovations and integrating ABOUT YOU,” said Robert Gentz, co-chief executive of Zalando. “Our unique data and infrastructure that we built over 17 years – including the richest fashion-specific data in Europe and the continent’s leading logistics network for fashion and lifestyle – are a massive advantage when supercharged with AI.”

In its release, the company hailed the growing use of its customer-facing AI tools. The Zalando Assistant now supports beauty-related recommendations, and 10 million customers have asked the tool for advice so far in 2026, up from 6 million across the whole of 2025. 

The other AI advances it mentioned include the rollout of robots across its European fulfilment network alongside Polish tech firm Nomagic, as well as Gen AI image processing, helping add missing material composition data to 6,000 articles daily. 

“Our first quarter results reflect the same unwavering financial and operational discipline we already showed last year. We promised profitable growth and delivered it – again,” said Zalando chief financial officer Anna Dimitrova. “Synergies are ahead of plan, our underlying business is strengthening every day, and our full-year guidance stands.”

Zalando’s full-year guidance is for gross merchandise value and revenue growth of 12% to 17% on a reported basis and an adjusted EBIT of between €660m and  €740m. 

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