Amazon and Ambani's Jio prepare for an epic India battle.
Amazon has begun to participate in anything from food delivery and insurance to medicines in India, establishing a historic rivalry with Mukesh Ambani's heavily-charged Jio Platforms.
The U.S. giant is fanning away at a pace not seen anywhere else in the world. Now in Bangalore Amazon delivers prescription and over-the-counter medicines and herbal remedies. It started selling car and motorbike insurance last month — a first for the online giant based in Seattle — claiming to finalize policies with no paperwork within just two minutes. Last year it operated a restaurant delivery service in parts of Bangalore for Prime subscribers. And also wealth management firms are officially announcing this year.
These varied choices align with Jio 's parent, Reliance Industries Ltd's similarly rapid-fire expansion. In only a few months, the energy-to-retail empire run by Ambani, one of the world's richest men, earned more than $20 billion in funding from investors like Facebook and Google's Alphabet to build an Indian Internet giant.
Reliance's retail business on Wednesday revealed that it has acquired a majority stake in a top Netmeds e-pharmacy. And it is getting ready to add a suite of financial products and services including insurance, brokering and mutual funds.
"It's going to be a difficult fight. Amazon and Reliance really want satisfy an individual's every need, from online shopping to financial services to entertainment", Senior Forecast Analyst at Forrester Research, Satish Meena said.
Jeff Bezos regards India as Amazon 's main frontier, particularly after it failed to break into China. Now he is facing a domestic competitor with some of his fiercest U.S. rivals behind him.
According to Forrester, the wildest battle will be in grocery stores, which accounts for 55 per cent of all Indian retail sales. Although it is still the early days, Amazon has consistently moved groceries through Amazon Pantry and generated them through Amazon Fresh.
Just recently, Reliance launched its JioMart app in 200 cities, and within weeks, it obtains an average of 250,000 orders a day. In addition, both are tussling over one of India's largest grocery chains, Future Retail, which runs Big Bazaar stores. Reliance is pursuing an acquisition but Amazon, which owns a minority stake, may not be able to give it to its competitor.
Amazon is now conducting farm-to-doorstep delivery of fruit and vegetables in the western town of Pune — another world first. It's a direct attack on Jio: Ambani recently said four-fifths of the fruits and vegetables sold on JioMart or have been directly acquired from farmers through its retail outlets.
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