Google poured 350 million USD into Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart

Technology giant Google will invest nearly $350 million in Flipkart, becoming one of the latest big names to support the Indian e-commerce company owned by Walmart.

According to Flipkart ‘s brief announcement, in addition to the investment, Google will also provide cloud computing services to the company. This deal is part of a nearly $1 billion capital raising round that Flipkart will launch from 2023. Walmart is the leader of this funding round, having invested $600 million late last year. (Microsoft is also an investor in Flipkart.)

With a valuation of $36 billion after a new round of capital, Flipkart is leading the e-commerce market in India, serving hundreds of millions of consumers in small cities and towns. According to research firm Bernstein, Flipkart, which also owns fashion e-commerce startup Myntra, has about 48% of India’s e-commerce market share.

Flipkart’s competitors include Reliance Retail, Amazon, SoftBank-backed Meesho and a growing number of fast delivery apps. Reliance Retail – run by Asia’s richest man Mukesh Ambani – operates the largest retail chain in India and is pushing to build an e-commerce platform. Reliance Retail was valued at $100 billion out of a nearly $2 billion investment from QIA, ADIA and KKR last year.

India’s e-commerce market is estimated to be worth $133 billion next year, according to Bernstein.

Bernstein analysts said in a recent report, “Indian e-commerce is witnessing the emergence of challengers in the instant commerce/social/vertical space. Amazon and Flipkart remains the leader thanks to its strengths in product categories such as mobile phones, consumer electronics and home appliances. However, it is not the same as the winners in the global e-commerce markets , India could see the emergence of category champions like Blinkit (fast delivery), Meesho (tier 2+ markets) and Nykaa (vertical e-commerce) as they expand scale of operations.”

With more than half a billion users in India, Google sees the South Asian country as a key overseas market. The company has revealed plans to invest $10 billion in Indian businesses by 2020. (Since then, Google has invested $4.5 billion in telecom operator Jio Platforms and another $1 billion in Airtel.)