Weekly News Wrap: Tata rolls out new e-commerce app; Flipkart raises IPO valuation target to $60-70b
And India’s antitrust body probes Zomato and Swiggy over alleged breaching neutrality rules.
From Bloomberg:
Tata Group rolled out its all-in-one e-commerce app allowing users to buy everything from apparel to airline tickets as the Indian conglomerate vies for a piece of the fiercely competitive sector currently dominated by Amazon, Walmart and Reliance Industries.
Mumbai-based Tata Digital’s digital services platform, Tata Neu will have in-house brands including Croma, Westside, AirAsia India, the Taj chain of luxury hotels and BigBasket, according to the group’s website.
Described as a “super-app” and in the pipeline since at least mid-2020, the website called it “a unified platform that connects several brands across the Tata universe like never before.”
The 154-year-old Tata group, which makes luxury cars, trucks, air conditioners, smart watches, tea besides operating luxury hotels, airlines, utilities, departmental stores and the local Starbucks franchise, wants to leverage the diversity of its products and services to lure buyers who are increasingly shopping online.
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From Reuters:
Walmart's Indian e-commerce company Flipkart has internally raised its IPO valuation target by around a third to $60-70b, and now plans a U.S. listing in 2023 instead of this year, two sources with direct knowledge of the plan said.
Flipkart, which competes with Amazon in India's booming e-commerce space, had earlier set an IPO valuation goal of $50b.
The main reason for waiting for the IPO is due to Flipkart's internal plan to boost valuations further by focussing on two of its relatively new businesses -- online healthcare services and travel bookings, the sources said.
They said the ongoing global market turmoil sparked by the Russia-Ukraine crisis also forced the Indian company to reconsider its timeline.
Flipkart acquired Indian travel booking website Cleartrip in 2021, and this week launched a "Health+" app to offer medicines as well as other healthcare products and services.
From Reuters:
India's antitrust watchdog has ordered an investigation of food delivery companies Zomato and Swiggy over the companies' apps being "neutral" platforms, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) said on Monday.
The order comes months after the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) asked the CCI to investigate the companies for breaching platform neutrality by providing priority to exclusive contractors.
"A conflict of interest situation has arisen in the present case, both with regard to Swiggy as well as Zomato ... which may come in the way of them acting as neutral platforms," the CCI said in an order.
The NRAI, which represents more than 500,000 restaurants across India, also alleged Zomato and Swiggy were misusing consumer data, charged exorbitant commissions and provided massive discounting.
"The Commission observes that it has already found merit in investigating the issue pertaining to platform neutrality," the CCI said.
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