Amazon India to use $3bn to enhance customer,seller experience

Armed with a fresh war chest of USD 3 billion investments in India announced by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos yesterday, Amazon plans to channel the funds on enhancing customer and seller experience, a top executive of the company said today.

“If you look back at the last few years of Amazon in India, we have focused on offering wide selection of goods at low prices, and fast and reliable delivery. We will replicate what Amazon has been doing in the US over the past 20 years.  We will focus on enhancing our customer and seller experience,” Amit Agarwal, Amazon India managing director told PTI today.

The USD 3 billion investments were announced by Bezos in an event in the US yesterday, and come in addition to the American e-commerce giant’s USD 2 billion infusion in 2014, taking the total investments here to over USD 5 billion.

“India is a key market for Amazon, and we will work towards continuing to reduce operating costs for sellers backed by good logistics and fulfilment capabilities,” Agarwal added. Asked about continuing with discounting policies, he said they will offer low prices for consumers, and easy returns, by focusing on lowering costs for sellers through easy shipping policies, and fulfilment by Amazon (FBA), its warehouse-based delivery model.

Amazon India has launched recent initiatives to on-board more sellers like self-service registration for quick and hassle-free registration, and Chai Cart to increase awareness among sellers on the benefits of selling online.

In the January-March quarter, Amazon India reported a 250 per cent increase in the number of sellers from the comparable quarter in 2015. The e-commerce player has over 85,000 registered sellers presently.

Currently, all e-commerce companies are in the process of complying with the recent guidelines on FDI in the sector, which stipulates that no single merchant can account for more than 25 per cent of sales in an online marketplace. Cloudtail India at present is the largest seller on Amazon India.