The groups plan to take on well-entrenched
players like Amazon, Flipkart, and Paytm by merging their offline businesses
with e-commerce initiatives.
Illustration:
Dominic Xavier
India’s top business
groups, such as Tata, Adani, and Reliance Industries, are scouting for
acquisition targets to offer additional goods and services under their “super
app” umbrella.
The conglomerates are
planning to offer personal loans, travel bookings, and movie tickets to create
a consolidated digital platform that will support their existing offline
businesses, say bankers.
The groups plan to take
on well-entrenched players like Amazon, Flipkart, and Paytm by merging their
offline businesses with e-commerce initiatives.
“Tata, Adani, and RIL have
millions of customers across their verticals. The super app will just bring them
under one umbrella and help cross-sell products,” said a banker close to the
development. “They are looking for those digital companies that are not in
their current portfolio and offer a ready customer base,” the banker said.
The Adani group is the latest
to join the bandwagon by acquiring a minority stake in travel portal,
Cleartrip, from Walmart-backed Flipkart group. Like Tata and RIL, the Adani
super app will support its offline businesses. The group had in September
acquired a 10 per cent stake in CSC Grameen eStore, a rural-focused grocery
store, to offer its range of food products, including Fortune oil, to rural
customers, say bankers. The group aims to add 1 billion customers to its
digital platform by 2030.
The Tata group, which
recently bought several e-commerce companies, is also on the prowl. Tata
Digital, which plans to launch TataNeu super app, will offer all goods and
services from the Tata group companies, including airline and hotel bookings.
The recently acquired e-commerce companies by the group, including BigBasket
and pharmaceutical product delivery firm 1MG, have been integrated into the
super app.
The Tata group employees
have been currently given access to the super app to check for any last-minute
issues.
Tata Capital, which has a significant
retail and corporate loan portfolio, is also expected to chip in by offering
loans to its super app customers.
Mukesh Ambani-owned RIL is
investing heavily in building its super app ecosystem and will offer services
from movie ticket bookings to travel tickets. It is also planning to integrate
the database from its latest acquisition, JustDial, to help customers connect
with small businesses around them.
Analysts are forecasting a
50 per cent market share for RIL in the online grocery market by the financial
year 2024-25, with a 30 per cent market share in overall e-commerce.
“This translates into $35
billion e-commerce GMV (gross merchant value) for RIL by FY25, with $19 billion
in grocery and rest by non-grocery. Overall, we expect retail Ebitda (earnings
before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) to grow 10 times from
current levels by FY30,” Goldman Sachs analysts led by Nikhil Bhandari said in
a note to its clients.
The new entrants would make
a dent in the market share of Paytm, Amazon, and Flipkart that are offering a
range of services to their customers, including payment gateways and air ticket
bookings. According to RedSeer, a management consulting firm in India, Paytm is
currently the leading payments platform in India with a gross merchant value
(GMV) of Rs 4.03 trillion as of March 2021. “But with cash-rich conglomerates
entering the market, it will be interesting to watch how the current players
retain their market share,” said another banker.