walmart pumps in $1.2billion to flipkart to take on Jiomart

Amazon vs Flipkart Market Share ( SP Global Intelligence )

Walmart is pumping in more money into Flipkart . Flipkart is infusion a new $1.2 billion financing round including a majority-stake in Flipkart in the Indian e-commerce giant. The fresh equity round led by Walmart, which acquired majority stake  of  77% in Flipkart for $16 billion two years ago, values Flipkart at $24.9 billion.

Walmart is raising more capital that  would help Flipkart, which was valued at $20.8 billion two years ago, further grow its e-commerce marketplace in India as the world’s second largest internet market begins to recover from Covid-19 crisis. A group of other existing investors also participated in the new financing round, a Flipkart spokesperson told TechCrunch but declined to identify them individually. “We’re grateful for the strong backing of our shareholders as we continue to build our platform and serve the growing needs of Indian consumers during these challenging times,” said Flipkart chief executive Kalyan Krishnamurthy in a statement. 

Flipkart, which competes with Amazon in India, said its monthly active customers figure surged 45% in the financial year that ended in March this year, compared to the year before, and these customers are making 30% more transactions. Flipkart recently surpassed 1.5 billion visits per month. 

According to Market intelligence firm SP Global Flipkart is the largest online retailer in India, with a 31.9% market share in 2018, followed by Amazon at 31.2%, according to Forrester. After adding the market share of its fashion specialty sites Myntra and Jabong, Flipkart controls a 38.3% market share.

The new capital infusion comes at a time when a new powerful player has started to make inroads in the Indian e-commerce market. JioMart, a joint venture between Reliance Retail (India’s largest retail chain) and Jio Platforms (India’s largest telecom operator), launched earlier this year in select sub urban areas of Mumbai and has since expanded to more than 200 cities and towns across the nation