Flipkart is owned 77% by Walmart.

Flipkart, the Indian online eCommerce site in which Walmart (NYSE: WMT) acquired nearly 80% for $16 billion in 2018, announced Tuesday a new equity round. The new funding led by Walmart values Flipkart at $24.9 billion post-money. A group of existing shareholders will also participate in the round alongside Walmart. (VCCiRCLE)

The new money will be used to expand the potential of Flipkart’s eCommerce website. It caters to India, the world’s second-largest internet market. The country is emerging from an extensive COVID-19 lockdown.

Flipkart reports solid growth

Flipkart CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy said in a statement: “Since Walmart’s initial investment in Flipkart, we have greatly expanded our offer through technology, partnerships, and new services. Today, we lead in electronics and fashion and are rapidly accelerating share in other general merchandise categories and grocery, all while providing increasingly seamless payment and delivery options for our customers. We will continue innovating to bring the next 200 million Indian shoppers online.”

Relevant statistics of Flipkart group for the financial year ended March 31, 2020:

• 5 billion site visits per month
• 45% growth in monthly active customers
• 30% growth in transactions per customer
• Offering 150 million products across more than 80 categories
• PhonePe (a payments service belonging to the Group) generated annualized total payments value (TPV) of $180 billion on more than 500 million monthly transactions.

However, competition looms over the horizon

However, both Flipkart and arch-rival Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) have a formidable rival muscling into their turf – JioMart, a new entrant in the online grocery business owned by Reliance Industries Ltd. (NSE: RELIANCE).

Reliance runs India’s largest physical retail network and its Jio digital business has recently tied up with Facebook’s (NASDAQ: FB) WhatsApp messaging service to support JioMart.

Today, Reliance announced that Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) would invest $4.5 billion for a 7.73% stake in the company’s Jio Platforms subsidiary.

Jio Platforms has raised over $20.6 billion in the past four months from 13 investors by selling about a 33% stake in the firm.

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