After leadership see-saw with Flipkart, Amazon infuses Rs 1950 Cr into seller service

In a fierce battle to maintain its supremacy over local players in India, global e-commerce behemoth Amazon has infused Rs 1,950 crore into its Indian arm Amazon Seller Services.

In November, the Seattle-based company had invested $450 million (Rs 2,900 crore) into Amazon Seller Service. It was the largest capital infusion into its marketplace arm ever in a year.

A month ago, it also infused Rs 1620 crores into its Indian marketplace arm to counter other e-tailers, especially rival Flipkart.

Earlier, Jeff Bezos had promised to invest $5 billion in its Indian business. Besides, Amazon India’s subsidiaries have received a combined Rs 2,868 crore since 2016.

Recently, Amazon India claimed that it did twice the order processed by Flipkart during recently concluded ‘Great India Sale’ (held during January 21-24). However, Flipkart stated that it has maintained a leadership position with 60-65 market share during ‘Republic Day Sale’.

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The US-headquartered online retailer outlined that its subscription-based membership Amazon Prime is increasing at a decent pace. Currently, industry estimates hint that the online retailer has about five-seven million members of its paid subscription.

Last month, Amit Agarwal, Senior Vice-President, and Country Manager Amazon India stated that 40 per cent of the company’s India volume is driven by Prime subscribers.

On the other hand, SoftBank-backed Flipkart hasn’t made any recent infusions into its marketplace. The Bengaluru-based etailer is focusing on scaling up and expanding its delivery infrastructure. Earlier this month, it invested $257 million in its logistics arm eKart.

Over the past few years, Amazon too has been on investment spree to acquire customers, creating fulfilment centres and sprucing up its distribution and logistics infrastructures. Currently, it has 41 warehouses in 13 cities in the country.

The development was first reported by ET.