E-commerce firms like Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra and others witnessed successful festive season sales this year, Experts say e-commerce adoption in the country is accelerating by multiple years or what it would have looked like in 2025.
That's because India does not have a serious venture capital industry with an appetite for risk, observes T N Ninan.
Walmart, the world's largest retailer, is tripling its sourcing from India to about $10 billion a year by 2027, said Judith McKenna, president, and chief executive officer of Walmart International, the segment which includes the company's operations outside the US. "To achieve this, we are growing our sourcing team in India," said McKenna, during a fireside chat with YourStory founder Shradha Sharma at Converge@Walmart, the flagship event of Walmart Global Tech India. "Walmart has a 20-year history of sourcing from India and already exports more than $3 billion worth of Made-in-India goods each year to 14 markets worldwide." McKenna said the company has expertise in processes such as international standards and demand forecasting that businesses need to get ready to export.
The partnership will also see the two parties cooperate on technology initiatives, including development of affordable smartphones.
CEOs expect to finish the ongoing March quarter with positive growth as the corporates get back to work in full strength.
Categories such as lifestyle, food and electronics accounted for over 1,350 sellers across the country last year.
For last two months, much of the discussion, a large part of due diligence, agreement negotiations, etc, have happened remotely.
Fresh capital will help Flipkart further grow its e-commerce marketplace in India as the world's second-largest internet market begins to recover from the COVID-19 crisis.
The group began to outperform the broader market only with the onset of the pandemic in March 2020 while earlier it was largely keeping pace with the Sensex. The group's market cap is up 164.4 per cent since the end of March 2020 against a 105 per cent rally in the Sensex.
E-commerce pilot for wholesale begins from July in Hyderbad and Lucknow
DMart's everyday low pricing model is being replicated aggressively by most players (online as well offline retailers), compelling the firm to keep prices down significantly.
The race to get a New Umbrella Entity (NUE) licence for digital payments may get crowded. As many as six consortiums are said to be in the fray to apply for an NUE licence, which would create a for-profit National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI)-like body for retail payments. A consortium led by Financial Software and Systems (FSS), a leading provider of payment products and payment processor, is in talks and may file an application to the RBI for an NUE license, said sources aware of the development. The other constituents of this group include Indian Bank, Central Bank of India, India Post Payments Bank, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard), and a few small finance banks.
The 'buy-now, pay-later' (BNPL) juggernaut continued to roll on during the festive season with multiple players seeing disbursals grow by more than 100 per cent compared to Diwali last year. LazyPay, the BNPL platform of Prosus-owned payments major PayU, witnessed a credit demand increase of 300 per cent over the festive season last year, especially in segments like travel, food & beverages and entertainment. "We also saw an uptick of 70 per cent in user acquisition in the last two months.
Tata Group's CLiQ is the latest to join the e-commerce club, to compete with the likes of Amazon, Flipkart and Snapdeal.
Jeff Bezos of Amazon tops the list for the second consecutive year with networth of $147 billion.
VCs have been especially bullish about India.
Amid news that the company was planning to scale down its online marketplace business and eventually exit it, Paytm Mall is targeting Rs 10,000 crore in business over the next 12 months, says Karan Choudhury.
Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Tuesday said India is a very special and important country with a remarkable entrepreneurship culture, as he sought to push deeper the just-launched payments services that allow users to make payments over WhatsApp. Last month, Facebook-owned WhatsApp received approval from the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) for rolling out its payments services in India. In 2018, WhatsApp started testing its UPI-based payments services in India -- a global first -- with about a million users.
The proposed e-commerce rule book issued recently by the ministry of consumer affairs does not mention foreign companies or foreign direct investment (FDI) at any place, unlike most other government guidelines for the sector so far. That is a heartening development since the latest proposals could be fine-tuned as e-commerce policy.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani on Friday backed the proposed data privacy and cryptocurrency bills, saying India is putting in place the most forward-looking policies and regulations. Ambani, who has been a votary of Indians owning and controlling their own data and the nation drafting strict rules around how digital information is stored and shared, said nations have the right to build and protect strategic digital infrastructure. Stating that data is the 'new oil', he said every citizen's right to privacy has to be safeguarded. "India is putting in place the most forward-looking policies and regulations," he said at the Infinity Forum, hosted by International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA).
Sachin Bansal, who had co-founded Flipkart with Binny Bansal in 2007, would exit the company
In the past few days, many companies, including fashion e-tailer Nykaa, food delivery platform Zomato, logistics and delivery firm Delhivery, insurance discovery platform PolicyBazaar, eyewear retail chain Lenskart, and edtech and online tutoring firm Byju's, have openly spoken about their IPO plans.
Live commerce, quick commerce, group buying, WhatsApp commerce, dukaantech have made their mark.
The iPhone 6 and its higher end model iPhone 6 Plus will be available across retail stores from October 17.
Amazon has seen its India sales growing four times this year.
Chinese mobile brands are deeply entrenched in the Indian market. A move to bar them may send a bold diplomatic message. But its cost for the local industry is anybody's guess. In the event that Chinese brands face curbs, two handset makers - Samsung and Apple - squarely stand to gain.
'If you allow Walmart to operate in India, our manufacturing will finish completely.' 'What will happen to Narendra D Modi's dream then? There will be no Make in India.'
Feedback from telecom members indicated a 10 per cent increase in traffic, but no fears of choked networks. Telcos currently use 65-70 per cent of the network capacity. In other words, they have enough additional capacity to handle the new pressure without clogging the system.
Today, India is one of the fastest-growing eCommerce markets in Asia/Pacific along with China.
If Modi rethinks on pro-biz policies, investors will suffer.
The 2016 upstart, called Jio, dislodged rivals and has emerged as the nation's No. 4 carrier by offering call services free for life and data transmission at dirt cheap rates.
"We are concerned about the data localisation law and the new e-commerce regulations...they do not fully take into account the needs of all stakeholders, including American and other foreign companies," acting principal deputy assistant secretary of the US, Thomas Vajda said.
'India missed the software products revolution (and now is in danger of missing the platform revolution), complacent that we are the software experts of the world based on IT services prowess,' points out Rajeev Srinivasan.
Nokia launches Nokia 7 Plus, 8 Sirocco series in India; relaunches Nokia 6 with new features.
A slew of Indian firms, including Flipkart, Byju's and Zomato, is building a path to profitability and diversifying into newer business segments ahead of mega-IPO plans.
India Inc has few leaders who are likely to grab headlines in 2015.
Most business groups in India, including Godrejs, Tatas and Mahindras, have seen patience tested in JVs, with some of them winding up quickly
From mass layoffs to acquisitions, here's how the Indian start-up industry kept us on our toes.
Reliance chairman Mukesh Ambani has moved 2 ranks ahead this year on the most powerful list.
Creative and confident, these emerging fashion designers are the future of Indian fashion.
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