26 September 2016, India :
Amazon has backed its wholesale business in India by investing Rs. 115 crore just ahead of a festive season.
Amazon Wholesale (India) Pvt. Ltd was founded in 2013 by Seattle-based tech company Amazon and functions as the B2B portal of the company in India. It also facilitates the sale of smartphones to sellers on Amazon India.
As per the official website, Amazon’s wholesale arm, which currently serves small and medium sized business (SMBs) in just Bengaluru and Mangaluru, lists office products, stationery, housekeeping supplies, kitchen, health, personal care, food and beverages.
Amazon’s investment comes after Alibaba is also showing keen interest in India’s B2B arm.
As per ET report, Amazon Business has over 10,000 sellers in Bengaluru already. The market opportunity in B2B commerce is expected to be larger than B2C. According to a Walmart report in 2014, India’s B2B ecommerce industry will grow to $700 billion by 2020 from $300 billion in that year. Source- ET