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September 17, 2025
Sowmya Ramasubramanian, Mint
17 September 2025
Snapdeal, run by AceVector, is relying on strong growth in fashion and apparel to strengthen its position in the competitive e-commerce space, especially during the high-stakes festive season when customer loyalty is low. According to CEO Achint Setia, the company has seen its fashion and lifestyle categories triple in growth this year, though exact figures remain undisclosed.
“Fashion has been a standout category this year and, in fact, has been possibly the fastest-growing one so far. Overall, lifestyle [including fashion, home decor, and kitchen] already accounts for 90% of our business today, and fashion is a major driving force,” Setia told Mint in an interview.
Setia was appointed to the role in January, replacing Himanshu Chakrawarti, who led Snapdeal and its subsidiary Stellaro Brands for three years. Setia has over two decades of experience across marketing and strategy roles in firms like Myntra, Viacom18 Media, and Zalora Group.
While the festival season is a key period for all consumer-facing brands and platforms, this year is important for Snapdeal as it is currently waiting for the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) clearance to list in the public markets.
“Approval from Sebi before the end of the financial year is crucial for Snapdeal. If they don’t get it, or if they have to refile, they’ll need to update their IPO documents with a full year of financial data. This means the festive season performance will be key in shaping investor sentiment, especially in a volatile market,” said a senior e-commerce executive, asking not to be named.
The firm filed its draft papers for an IPO reportedly to raise ₹500 crore through the confidential route in July, which allows it to withhold public disclosure of IPO details until later stages. Setia declined to comment on the progress of the filing.
Despite its early entry, Snapdeal is yet to make a mark among the top e-commerce players in the country by both market share and volume of transactions. For context, industry estimates show Flipkart as the market leader with 48% share, followed by Meesho and Amazon. The Indian e-commerce market is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21% and reach $325 billion dollars in 2030 as per an October 2024 report by Deloitte.
Founded in 2010 by Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, Snapdeal was initially launched as a daily deals platform and later pivoted to a full-fledged marketplace in 2011. Over the years it raised more than $1.8 billion in funding from Softbank, Alibaba group, Foxconn and Blackrock among others. However, intense competition and the absence of a distinct growth strategy have gradually eroded Snapdeal’s momentum in the e-commerce space.
Snapdeal largely caters to cities outside metropolitan areas where value retail has picked up in recent years. Within this, fashion remains the top growth driver-with more than 80% of orders placed priced below 1599 and 80% of them com-ing from small town India, accord-ing to CEO Setia. “For us, it’s about the value-conscious mindset that could be sitting out of anywhere,” he noted.
Over the last few months, Snapdeal has invested substantially in in-house festive campaigns, as well as technology and tools for returns forecasting and logistics. According to Setia, it has also expanded its seller portfolio, adding more from key clusters like Tirupur, Surat, Ludhiana, and Agra.
According to a September 2024 report by market research firm Centrum, the mass-market fashion segment accounts for 56% of India’s total apparel market.
However, offline continues to account for more than half the sales, with Tata’s Trent, D-Mart, and Vishal Mega Mart offering a sufficient selection of price-conscious consumers in smaller towns.
While small-town India offers a wide online shopping-savvy market waiting to be captured, Meesho has raced past Snapdeal in those geographies, especially in value commerce.
“For a very long time, Snapdeal has been positioned as an e-commerce platform for Bharat, but it doesn’t necessarily hold a strong position. Meesho, Flipkart and Amazon have expanded their presence in these markets over the years, which means competition is so much more now,” said Devangshu Dutta, founder and chief executive officer at consulting firm Third Eyesight.
(Published in Mint)
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September 5, 2025
Shalinee Mishra, Exchange4Media
5 September 2025
Retailers in India are waking up to a hard truth: customer acquisition can no longer ride on advertising alone. Digital ad spends grew by 14-17% in 2024, touching nearly ₹50,000 crore (as per Pitch Madison report) and accounting for 46% of India’s total ad market. But with customer acquisition costs (CAC) rising 30-35% year-on-year and consumer attention fragmented across platforms, the ad-first growth engine is showing strain. What is emerging instead is an ecosystem where content in the form of video, celebrity-led storytelling, or creator-driven engagement is becoming the direct funnel to commerce.
Flipkart for instance is building influencer production hubs and embedding shoppable videos, Myntra has rolled out its video-first Glamstream, and Amazon has long blurred the line between streaming and shopping through Prime Video and Fire TV. From short videos to celebrity gossip, from beauty blogs to shoppable livestreams, e-commerce giants are no longer just marketplaces; they are evolving into media houses and the trend is only growing.
According to Mindshare’s latest Content Trend Report, India’s branded content marketing industry is now worth ₹10,000 crore, growing at nearly 20% annually, with video formats making up almost half of all spends.
India already has over 270 million online shoppers, a number that Bain projects will rise to 350 million by 2027, making it the world’s second largest e-retail user base. That scale is creating fertile ground for shoppable video and live commerce to take off.
Globally, branded content spend is projected to cross $500 bn by 2027. As per PwC estimates, India’s share is still <2% but among the fastest growing.
Video commerce today largely follows two prominent models. The first is driven by social platforms such as YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook, where shoppable posts allow users to move directly from content to purchase. The second is led by e-commerce platforms like Amazon, Myntra, Nykaa, and Flipkart and others which have added video sections to create immersive shopping experiences within their apps.
Within this, live commerce has emerged as a high-potential format. Meesho and Flipkart, for example, are leading the charge with 2-3% conversion rates, generating an estimated $150-200 million in GMV during festive 2024. Events like Flipkart’s Big Billion Days show how timed livestreams can capture active, purchase-ready audiences.
Meanwhile, influencer-led short videos are driving conversion rates as high as 63%, with beauty and personal care (BPC) and food & beverages (F&B) among the top categories benefiting from this shift. Redseer projects India’s live commerce market could touch $4-5 bn GMV by 2027, up from less than $300 mn today. This surge in shoppable video and live commerce is only the surface of a deeper structural change, one where content itself is becoming the moat that protects brands from rising ad costs, fragmented attention, and fickle consumer loyalty.
Beyond ads: Why content has become retail’s strongest defence
Chirag Taneja, co-founder of e-commerce enablement company GoKwik, framed the trend as a fundamental shift in ownership.
“It’s not just about enhancing top-of-funnel reach, it’s about owning demand, connection, and the touchpoint with end shoppers. For years, brands relied on ads to bring traffic. But acquisition costs have been rising, attention is fragmented, and privacy shifts have made targeting difficult. That’s why content is now the moat. When companies acquire content firms, they’re not just buying eyeballs, they’re securing access to communities that trust and engage with that content.”
According to him, content is collapsing the traditional funnel. “One short video or livestream can take a consumer from awareness to purchase in under a minute. That’s why we see D2C brands treating content as a compounding asset, not just an expense,” he added.
Devangshu Dutta, founder and CEO of management consulting firm Third Eyesight, echoed the sentiment.
“Large companies are buying or partnering with content-driven platforms to capture attention beyond transactional touch points. Short video, regional language content, and influencer-driven discovery are embedding commerce within entertainment. If you want to sell more than a commodity, storytelling is critical. Content builds credibility, differentiation, and trust in a cluttered and price-sensitive market.”
Flipkart bets big on media and creators
The shift is already reshaping strategy at India’s biggest retailers, and Flipkart has moved fastest. Its move to acquire a majority stake in Pinkvilla, a platform built on entertainment and celebrity news signals a clear push to deepen ties with Gen Z and millennials, a cohort that consumes content first and shops later.
“Our acquisition of a majority stake in Pinkvilla is a critical step in our mission to deepen our engagement with Gen Z. Pinkvilla’s robust content IPs and strong connection with its loyal audience base are assets that will accelerate our efforts to leverage content as a key driver of growth,” said Ravi Iyer, Senior Vice President, Corporate at Flipkart.
Flipkart in the last year has exited investments in companies like Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail, where it sold its 7.5% stake in the owner of Pantaloons, Van Heusen, Louis Philippe and Forever 21, as well as BlackBuck, the trucking marketplace that powers India’s mid-mile logistics.
At the same time, the company has doubled down on content and creators. Its Pinkvilla acquisition gives it access to a platform reaching over 60 million monthly users, while in-house features like Flipkart Feed already clock 5–6 million daily video views, highlighting how commerce and content are converging at scale.
Alongside this, Flipkart has launched Creator Cities in Mumbai, Bengaluru and Gurgaon, production hubs designed for influencers to shoot and scale shoppable content.
It has also introduced Flipkart Feed, a TikTok-style vertical video feature embedded in its app, offering bite-sized, influencer-led, fully shoppable videos. Myntra, its fashion arm, has developed Glamstream, with more than 500 hours of video-first shopping content across music, beauty, travel and weddings, featuring stars like Badshah, Tabu, Zeenat Aman and Vijay Deverakonda.
Flipkart has also partnered with YouTube Shopping, allowing creators with over 10,000 subscribers to tag Flipkart products in videos, Shorts and livestreams, enabling viewers to buy directly while creators earn commissions.
Amazon’s head start in content-commerce convergence Flipkart is not alone. Its biggest rival Amazon has long understood this convergence. Through Prime Video and its original programming slate, Amazon has built an entertainment ecosystem that doubles as a commerce funnel. The shows and films on Prime do not merely entertain; they drive shopping behaviour, influence trends, and lock audiences into Amazon’s larger universe of services. With Fire TV and Alexa integrations, the company has blurred the line between watching and buying, a model others are now racing to replicate.
D2C brands treat content as growth engine
Closer home, the Good Glamm Group, now closed, had pioneered a content-led commerce ecosystem in beauty and personal care. Through acquisitions like ScoopWhoop and MissMalini Entertainment, the group stitched together a portfolio where content platforms brought in audiences, who were then nudged towards its direct-to-consumer brands.
This “editorial-to-checkout” model demonstrated how cultural capital could be translated into purchase pathways. Alibaba has taken the strategy global. With stakes in Youku, a leading video-streaming platform, and Alibaba Pictures, the e-commerce titan integrates entertainment with retail operations. Taobao Live has shown how livestream shopping can dominate consumer behavior, particularly inAsia, creating billion-dollar shopping events entirely dependent on
entertainment-driven discovery.
Shopify, meanwhile, has invested in tools that empower merchants to become content creators themselves. Its partnerships with agencies like Sanity and investments in platforms such as Billo reflect a clear intent to enable retailers to embed storytelling, gamification, and user-generated content into their selling journey. Unlike large marketplaces, Shopify’s vision is not to own the content but to democratize access to it for small and mid-sized businesses.
From content to commerce
This content includes newsletters, creator partnerships, branded podcasts, and niche communities on social media. The idea, as industry experts note, is to treat content as an asset that compounds, not just as a cost.
Unlike ads, content continues to generate discovery and engagement long after it’s published. That’s why more D2C brands are making content central to their growth strategies.
Several big names are experimenting in this space. Durex, Plum, Mother Dairy, and HDFC Bank have launched their own podcasts where celebrities share stories along their brand journey. Founder-led podcasts too are on the rise on YouTube, with voices like Nitin Kamath and Deepinder Goyal drawing large audiences in India.
The big question, however, is whether content consumption can effectively be converted into product discovery and purchase pathways. “It’s already happening at scale,” said Taneja. “Content is redefining every aspect of the traditional funnel. In the past, you had awareness at the top, intent in the middle, and purchase at the bottom. Today, one short video or live stream can take a consumer through that entire journey in under a minute.
“From a D2C lens, this convergence is even more critical. D2C brands thrive on agility, the ability to turn trends, storytelling, and community engagement directly into sales. Platforms like Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and even WhatsApp have embedded shoppable features, which means the content is no longer just ‘top-of-funnel.’ It’s the storefront. But the magic lies in authenticity and design. Consumers don’t want to feel ‘sold to’, they want to feel entertained, inspired, or educated. If the content does that well, conversion becomes a natural byproduct. For example, an athleisure brand showing a workout routine isn’t just demonstrating leggings, it’s giving value. The leggings purchase becomes an easy next step, not a forced pitch.”
The big question: Will content sustain sales at scale?
Taneja further reveals how content is driving sales and long-term growth. “The smartest brands, especially in D2C, have realized that high-quality
content is their most defensible growth engine. Performance marketing will continue to play a role, but the real long-term moat is the kind of content that builds relationships, trust, and recall. Consumers today are spoiled for choice. They don’t buy just products, they buy stories, values, and communities.
“High-quality content allows a brand to consistently show up in ways that feel relevant and credible. And from a business lens, it directly impacts unit economics: it reduces CAC because organic discovery compounds over time, improves LTV because content nurtures loyalty and repeat purchases, and builds resilience because brands with strong content ecosystems are less dependent on fluctuating ad platforms.”
The D2C ecosystem in India is already proving this point. Beauty and personal care brands now run editorial-led platforms alongside commerce, while fashion labels thrive on creator collaborations and storytelling-driven product drops. Their growth is not accidental but built on content strategies that treat every piece not just as a post, but as a business driver.
As an enabler, Taneja adds, the results are visible across platforms. “Brands that invest in content see better conversions on our checkout stack, lower cart drops, and stronger repeat cohorts. Content doesn’t just spark sales it sustains them.”
For all the optimism, the test for content-driven commerce will lie in scale and sustainability. Rising conversions in beauty, fashion, and food show the model works, but questions remain on whether every category can replicate that success, or whether consumers will tire of content-heavy shopping pitches.
(Published in Exchange4Media)
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July 27, 2025
Alenjith K Johny & Ajay Rag, Economic Times
Jul 27, 2025
Startups in the 60-minute fashion delivery segment are betting on features such as ‘try and buy’ and artificial intelligence (AI)-powered virtual try-ons to tackle high return rates, a key pain point in the segment. These tools are helping increase conversion rates and reduce returns while offering greater flexibility to buyers, said industry executives.
Mumbai-based Knot, which recently raised funding from venture capital firm Kae Capital, said partner brands that typically see return rates of about 20% on their direct-to-consumer websites are witnessing sub-1% returns through offline stores, a trend it is now replicating through these digital features.
“Our partner brands, which have offline stores, would typically witness 20% returns on their direct to consumer websites. But for the same purchases on offline stores, the returns are less than 1%. That is the idea. With the ‘try and buy’ feature, users can make a very decisive purchase at their doorstep,” Archit Nanda, CEO of Knot, told ET.
Return rates among users of the company’s virtual try-on feature are similarly much lower than the platform’s overall user base, he said.
Other venture-backed quick fashion delivery startups such as Bengaluru-based Slikk, Mumbai-based Zilo and Gurugram-based Zulu Club are also testing similar features to increase conversions and reduce returns.
“Returns play as big a part as maybe forward delivery does. Because these are expensive products, giving the customer his or her money back also plays a very critical role,” said Akshay Gulati, cofounder and CEO of Slikk.
Instant returns
Slikk is piloting an ‘instant returns’ feature where, like its 60-minute delivery service, returns are also completed within an hour. Once a return request is made on the app, a delivery partner picks up the product and refunds the amount instantly. The startup claims its return rate is 40-50% lower than that of traditional marketplaces and that it doesn’t charge customers any extra fees for returns.
Some users said they were satisfied with the delivery speed and trial window but pointed out that the app does not provide any return status updates until the product reaches the warehouse.
“I received my order within 60 minutes and had enough time to try it out. However, after returning the product, I didn’t receive any notification in the application until the delivery agent reached the warehouse,” said Mohammed Shibili, a working professional based in Bengaluru, who tried Slikk’s feature.
Investor interest
Investors tracking the segment estimate that try-and-buy and virtual try-on features can reduce return rates by 15-20 percentage points, translating into substantial cost savings for both platforms and brands.
“Features like try and buy are a huge cost save, not just for the platform but also for the brand. The brand otherwise would lose that inventory till it comes back and can’t make the sale on it. But now, that’s all getting quickly turned around. So, for the brand, it’s a win-win situation as well as for the customer where the money is not getting stuck till it gets the returns refunded,” said Sunitha Viswanathan, partner at Kae Capital.
Old model, new infrastructure
Flipkart-owned fashion etailer Myntra had introduced try and buy back in 2016 to attract traditional shoppers to online retail. However, the feature didn’t scale up due to supply chain limitations, according to industry executives.
“Back when Myntra launched ‘try and buy’, there was no hyperlocal delivery infrastructure. Deliveries were through national courier services. That model isn’t feasible to try and buy unless you have your own hyperlocal delivery fleet,” the founder of a fashion delivery startup said on condition of anonymity.
The founder added that while Myntra operated from large warehouses located on the outskirts of cities, the new-age supply chains are built within cities, allowing faster deliveries and enabling features like try and buy.
By the end of last year, Myntra had launched M-Now, an ultra-fast delivery service currently live in Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi, with pilots in other cities. The company said daily orders through M-Now doubled in the last quarter.
“Although it’s still early, our observations so far suggest that the quick delivery model, with its reduced wait time, attracts high-intent customers, leading to naturally lower return rates,” said a spokesperson for Myntra.
The etailer did not confirm whether the try-and-buy feature is being tested under M-Now.
Viability concerns persist
Despite the benefits, the long-term viability of these features is open to question, experts said.
“There is a cost to also providing these services (like try and buy), and whether that becomes viable at all is a question mark at this point of time. I think that’s what the concern is, and it has not been that viable,” said Devangshu Dutta, founder of Third Eyesight, a management consulting firm focused on consumer goods and retail industries.
He added that when platforms offer the try-and-buy feature, delivery executives have to wait while customers try on products, which increases the cost per delivery and reduces the number of deliveries that can be completed. Despite that, some items may still be returned, further impacting operational efficiency.
However, startups are experimenting with these features mainly on higher-margin products to offset operational costs, Dutta said, as return rates across fashion categories can range from under 10% to as high as 40% for certain items.
(Published in Economic Times)
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July 16, 2025
Prabhanu Kumar Das, Medianama
16 July 2025
E-commerce logistics platform Shiprocket announced the launch of Shunya.ai, a sovereign AI model developed in India to support the country’s Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), on July 11. The company claims that it is India’s first multimodal AI stack, built in partnership with US-based Ultrasafe Inc.
This announcement comes at the heels of Shiprocket filing a confidential draft red herring prospectus (DHRP) with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in May 2025 for their Initial Public Offering (IPO). The company is expected to raise around Rs 2500 crore in its IPO.
What does the AI model offer?
As per Shiprocket’s website, Shunya.ai is built on a freemium model, with unlimited access priced at Rs 499 a month for MSMEs. It is directly integrated into the Shiprocket platform and offers AI agents across multiple languages. According to the company, the agents can perform the following tasks:
Shiprocket CEO Saahil Goel stated, “We’ve adapted Shunya.ai from the ground up for Indian languages, commerce workflows, and MSME needs. By embedding it directly into our platform, we’re giving over 1,50,000 sellers instant access to tools that are intelligent, local, and scalable, levelling the playing field for businesses across Bharat.” Notably, Larsen and Toubro’s AI cloud arm, Cloudfiniti is reportedly providing the underlying GPU infrastructure, ensuring that all data processing and storage remains within India.
This AI model does offer multiple benefits but it will not level the playing field against big players, as per Devangshu Dutta who is the founder of specialist consulting firm, Third Eyesight.
“While Shunya AI can help small businesses compete better, it won’t completely level the playing field. Large companies still have greater organisational capacity and capability to respond to the insights offered, including more data and bigger budgets. The real benefit for small businesses is improving how they work and serve customers within their current markets, rather than suddenly competing with giants,” Dutta said.
The E-Commerce AI Pivot
This is not the first time that an Indian e-commerce platform has unveiled a B2B AI service through its existing platform. Zepto recently launched Zepto Atom in May 2025, a real-time tool that offers consumer brands available on the platform minute-level updates, PIN-code level performance maps, and Zepto GPT, a Natural Language Processing (NLP) assistant trained on internal data that brands can query about their stock keeping units (SKUs) and performance data.
Zomato and its e-commerce arm Blinkit have also been growing their AI capabilities. Analytics India Magazine previously reported that the company’s generative AI team has grown from 3 to 20 engineers in the time-span of a year. Zomato introduced a personalised AI food assistant for users, and also uses AI in its backend to optimise delivery times and improve consumer support. Blinkit also released the Recipe Rover AI in May 2023, an AI assistant for recipes.
Other companies like Swiggy with ‘What to Eat’ AI, Myntra’s MyFashionGPT AI shopping assistant, and Amazon’s Rufus have also adopted AI assistants on their platform as a tool for the consumer.
The issue of merchant stickiness
Dutta asserts that this shift means platforms like Zepto and Shiprocket are changing from being service providers to becoming data intelligence companies. They are generating, or are in the process of generating revenue through transactional data that flows through the company.
“While this can create better insights and automation for merchants on these platforms, it also could make the merchants more dependent on the platforms. Once a merchant builds its operations around a platform’s specific AI tools and insights, it becomes much harder to switch to a competitor – creating stronger merchant stickiness. We already see this in infrastructure and core services such as banking and financial services, enterprise cloud services, building management etc. and the same is likely to happen in AI-enabled process management”, he said.
Why this matters
As Shiprocket is preparing for an IPO, Shunya.ai becomes another means to generate revenue for the company. This app can extend Shiprocket’s reach to local physical stores and MSMEs, by offering them the opportunity to provide the same experiences and support to the consumer that larger retailers and e-commerce platforms do, while automating delivery automation, cataloguing, and customer support.
Furthermore, the launch of this model is also part of the larger trend of AI integration and automation, both within e-commerce platforms for their consumers and within the back-end for optimisation.
Competition in these sectors and merchant stickiness may also become an issue, as businesses hosted on these e-commerce services may become reliant on specific AI tools and their outputs.
Questions of data privacy are also important when it comes to service companies moving towards data intelligence: How do these AI models gather and use data? The consent of end-consumers in these B2B models, data storage, and security are all issues that need to be studied as e-commerce and retails pivots towards AI.
Some Unanswered Questions
MediaNama has reached out to Shiprocket with the following questions and will update the article when we receive a response.
(Published in Medianama)
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July 10, 2025
Alka Jain, Outlook Business
10 July 2025
Just when Blinkit, Instamart and Zepto were slowing down in their quick commerce game, Amazon’s entry may spur them towards a more aggressive race. The ecommerce giant has begun offering deliveries in as little as ten minutes in Delhi after Bengaluru, under the name ‘Amazon Now’.
“We are excited with the initial customer response and positive feedback, especially from Prime members. Based on this, we are now expanding the service over the next few months addressing immediate customer needs while maintaining Amazon’s standards for safety, quality and reliability,” the company said in an official statement.
Till now, the company was moving at its own pace with the idea that Indian consumers would wait a day or two for their deliveries. But the game has changed now—convenience is king here. Online shoppers want everything from milk to mobile chargers within a few minutes at their doorsteps.
And the big three of the quick commerce market—Blinkit, Instamart, Zepto—have cracked the consumer code perfectly. This trend has nudged Amazon and Flipkart to enter the 10-minute delivery segment. It started as an experiment in the larger ecommerce sector but has now become a necessity for online retailers.
Kathryn McLay, chief executive of Walmart International—an American multinational retail corporation—revealed that quick commerce now accounts for 20% of India’s ecommerce market and is growing at a rate of 50% annually. According to a Morgan Stanley report, the market is expected to reach $57bn by 2030.
Hence, Amazon could not afford to stay on the sidelines. The company has already pumped $11bn into Indian market since 2013 and recently announced another $233mn to upgrade its infrastructure and speed up deliveries. In addition, it has also opened five fulfilment centres across the country.
Despite continued investment, there are doubts if Amazon can disrupt the quick commerce game. Industry experts state that the ecommerce major’s late entry could upend the fragile unit economics of the space. It can even reignite discount wars and increase burn rate (a company spending its cash reserve while going through loss) for the incumbents, once the ecommerce giants begin to exert pressure and begin to capture market share.
Open Market, Thin Margins
Given the growth momentum and market size, quick commerce start-up Kiko.live cofounder Alok Chawla believes that there is definitely headroom to accommodate another player in the quick commerce market. However, margins may remain negative for a couple of years due to high business and delivery costs.
As per data, the average order value of ₹350–₹400 yields a gross margin of approximately 20% but high fulfilment and delivery costs (₹50–₹60 per order) significantly reduce overall profitability, often cancelling out most of the gains.
“Indian customers will not be willing to pay high shipping charges for convenience. But the market will continue to grow due to cart subsidies and shipping discounts. On top of this, profitability also remains quite some time away,” he says.
Even a survey by Grant Thornton Bharat, a professional services firm, shows that 81% of Indian quick commerce users cite discounts and offers as one of the main reasons they shop on platforms like Blinkit and Instamart.
But the fact is Amazon has extremely deep pockets, which means, the trio will once again have to get into aggressive discounting to protect their turf, said Chawla, indicating the possibility of higher cash burn quarters ahead.
In February, reports revealed that Indian quick commerce companies, including new entrants, were burning cash to the tune of ₹1,300–₹1,500 crore on a monthly basis. But a few months later, Aadit Palicha, chief executive of Zepto, a fast-growing 10-minute delivery platform, claimed that the company had slashed its operating cash burn by 50% in the previous quarter.
Still, the path to profitability remains shaky. Though Amazon can get an advantage of its existing huge customer base that is habitual of making online purchases including those in similar categories.
The real challenge lies beneath the surface because ecommerce and quick commerce operate on fundamentally different engines.
E-Comm vs Q-Comm: A Different Game
It may seem like a simple extension of what Amazon already does: deliver products. But in practice, the logistics, timelines and cost structures behind traditional ecommerce and quick commerce are different, said Somdutta Singh, founder and chief executive of Assiduus Global, a cross-border ecommerce accelerator that helps brands scale on global marketplaces through end-to-end solutions.
She explains the difference using a hypothetical situation: let’s say you order a phone case in Mumbai, which is picked from a nearby fulfilment centre. It will be added to a pre-routed delivery run with 30-50 other stops. This batching on the basis of route optimisation, keeps last-mile costs low, somewhere around ₹40–₹80.
But if you order the same item in a smaller town like Alleppey, it may first travel mid-mile from a hub in Cochin, then be handed off to a local partner like India Post. This increases the delivery time but keeps costs manageable through scale and planned routing.
This setup suits well in ecommerce business, which is built for reach and variety, not for speed. However, quick commerce runs on a completely different playbook because speed becomes priority here.
For instance, you order a pack of chips and a cold drink via Zepto in Andheri. These items are already stocked in a dark store within one to two kilometers of your home. The moment you place the order; someone picks it off the shelf. A rider is dispatched almost immediately and heads directly to your address.
There is no mid-mile movement, no routing logic and no batching. Each trip is a solo run. Delivery often happens within 10 to 15 minutes. This kind of speed relies on a dense network of local stores and a steady flow of short-range riders. But it also means higher costs.
“With no bundling of orders and lower average cart sizes, usually ₹250 to ₹300, the delivery cost per order can shoot up to ₹60 to ₹120. That is a heavy operational burden. Unlike traditional ecommerce, where cost efficiency scales with distance and order volume, quick commerce is constrained by geography and time pressure,” she explains.
So, it becomes more than just a category expansion for e-commerce platforms like Amazon and Flipkart. It marks a pivot in their “logistics thinking” and signals a broader shift in entry strategies. What once worked must now be retooled for hyperlocal and real-time operations.
Speed over Scale Not Easy
There are multiple challenges ahead for Amazon to make its presence felt and stay competitive in the quick commerce space. Firstly, it must build an operations and logistics layer that enables sub-15-minute deliveries, along with a technology stack to support it, according to Mit Desai, practice member at Praxis Global Alliance, a management consulting firm.
Second, it needs to build a dark store network to succeed in the space which is crucial to meet the 10-15 minutes delivery promise. Experts believe that a hybrid model will be the most successful in India—a mix of micro warehouses, partner stores and dark stores.
Desai states that Amazon’s existing capabilities can give it a base to build on, but it would also have to account for complexities and differences that come with the quick commerce business.
“For Amazon, the challenge will be operations. Can they build 700+ dark stores? Can they go hyperlocal? Can they navigate the chaos of Gurugram rain, Bengaluru traffic or the lanes of Dadar?” wonders Madhav Kasturia, founder and chief executive of Zippee, a quick commerce fulfilment start-up focused on hyperlocal deliveries and dark store management.
Another challenge can be repeat, loyal customers. As of now, customers check prices across platforms, and order where prices are the lowest. So, Amazon will have to spend heavily on discounts to gain market share. Chawla says retention will remain a problem because Zepto’s growth has also slowed down after a reduction in discounting burn.
However, Singh highlights that Amazon may not roll out everything in one shot. “We will likely see small-scale pilots, co-branded dark stores, local partnerships, new rider networks, tested in top cities before any nationwide push. They will also reveal whether it is viable to retrofit scale-driven e-commerce infrastructure into something that runs well in a hyperlocal loop,” she added.
Profitability Remains a Concern
While the quick commerce space is becoming increasingly dynamic with new entrants, the core question remains: is it a sustainable business model? The path to profitability is still fraught with operational complexity, margin constraints and uncertainty in consumer behaviour.
“Margins in quick commerce were never pretty to begin with,” says Kasturia. Yet he remains optimistic about the market because India’s grocery market is still largely untapped online.
As per data, India’s grocery and essentials market is over $600bn, of which online commerce is just three to four percent. Even quick commerce is sitting at ₹7,000–₹9,000 crore gross merchandise value today. So, the market isn’t crowded. It’s just early.
“We are barely scratching the surface,” he says, arguing that whoever wins customer behaviour, will lead the game. For example, in tier 1 cities, users no longer compare prices—they compare time.
For Amazon, this is both an opportunity and a constraint. Experts believe that the ecommerce giant can stand out by focusing on trust, hygiene and reliability—areas where existing players sometimes falter.
Kasturia says that the platform should not even chase everything, rather focus on profitable categories like fruits, dairy and personal care. “Build strong private labels. Nail density before geography and don’t discount blindly,” he adds.
The key is to build for reorders, not virality. That’s when customer acquisition cost (CAC) drops, margins compound and a player stops bleeding money per order. And to reduce the cost of dark stores, Chawla suggests an alternative route.
“Riding to neighbourhood stores for long-tail stock keeping unit can cut real estate and wastage costs,” he says, adding that it can decentralise inventory without owning all of it.
To follow this playbook, Devangshu Dutta, founder of Third Eyesight, a management consulting and services firm, says that every player needs to invest hundreds of crores before the model begins to show surplus cash. It will demand multiple, interlocked shifts—in pricing strategy, tech backbone, category mix, and even brand positioning.
Amazon’s entry doesn’t merely add another contender in the 10-minute delivery race—it rewrites the playbook for every player. The real question now is: can the frontrunners hold their turf, or will Amazon’s scale and deep pockets tip the balance of power?
