Liyia Wu

Liyia Wu is Founder & CEO of ShopShops, the leading livestream retail marketplace for fashion, beauty and lifestyle products. ShopShops streams with over a thousand partners, across the U.S., Middle East, Europe and Asia, including brands like Marni, Jimmy Choo, Rebecca Minkoff, Zac Posen, Everlane, Away, and rag & bone. It’s shopper base today is primarily in China where live streaming accounts for a huge portion of e-commerce spend. Given the impact of COVID on U.S. brick and mortar stores, ShopShops is accelerating its launch to U.S. shoppers. By virtualizing the physical shopping experience, ShopShops is breaking down geographical boundaries for savvy customers and allowing them to shop – not just buy things – from the palm of their hand.

Liyia graduated with a double major in finance and accounting from Sauder’s Business School of the University of British Columbia, which she put to use towards a media and advertising job in Beijing. In 2005, she moved to New York City and switched gears to study fashion merchandising at Parsons, and after working for a fashion brand as a merchandiser for three years, Wu founded a boutique in Beijing that carried U.S. designer brands, including Tory Burch, Loeffler Randall and Helmut Lang, among others. In 2009, she started her own contemporary fashion label, which was sold out of its own boutiques in Beijing, as well as retailers across China. By 2015, she combined her business and fashion knowledge from both the U.S. and Beijing to launch ShopShops, which, originally, served as an online directory of U.S. retailers for Chinese travelers whose plans involved a lot of shopping.