Amazon launches online in India

Online retailer Amazon launched its India marketplace, 'Amazon.in', on Wednesday, offering books, movies and television shows for sale.

According to industry watchers, it notched up nearly 10,000 orders on the first day of operations.  In this current marketplace model however, Amazon will not own any merchandise sold but will act as platform for any retailer who wishes to sell his products.

Amazon.in is a trusted and meaningful sales channel for retailers of all sizes across india, enabling them to succeed and efficiently grow their business online.

 To start with, Amazon.in has over 12,000 movie and television titles and 7 million book titles for purchase.  It plans to expand soon into categories such as cameras and mobile phones.

 The new marketplace model allows the company to sidestep regulatory hurdles that prevent foreign retailers from owning an Indian arm for direct sales.

Amazon.in will not only compete with Indian online shopping services such as Flipkart, HomeShop18 and Snapdeal but will also have to take on eBay.in, that runs on a similar model.

Amazon's India service begins with a limited offering in two categories - Books and Movies & TV - but the company says additional categories would be added soon.

Amazon is also introducing two new programmes, 'Sell on Amazon' and 'Fulfilment by Amazon', for Indian sellers. Amazon.in is operated by Amazon Seller Services Private Ltd, an affiliate of Amazon.com, Inc.

Amazon.in provides retailers access to the company's fulfilment services, which allow shoppers to pay for items after they've been delivered.

In a statement on Wednesday, the company announced the launch of Amazon.in, featuring over 7 million print books spanning over 200 categories, and over 12,000 English and Hindi movies and TV shows.

Unlike Amazon sites in other countries, the site is strictly for third-party sellers, according to a CNET report. The Indian site will not be selling Amazon own inventory due to the country's regulations restricting multibrand retailers from selling their own products online, it noted.

Instead, Amazon will act as a fulfillment agent for hundreds of sellers across India. Sellers can send their products across India from the company's fulfilment center located on the outskirts of Mumbai, from where they are packaged and shipped out by Amazon.

The US company has been pressing officials to allow it to launch its full Amazon.com service  in India. Amazon Global Vice-President Paul E. Misener met with country’s Commerce Minister Anand Sharma in February to put the issue on the agenda. Misener said the meeting covered “all kinds of issues” and that the firm is “trying to find a better way to serve our Indian customers, both sellers and buyers”.

The timing of that news, a day before Amazon.in’s launch, is almost certainly related. The new service will allow Amazon to learn more about Indian e-commerce market and consumer habits before the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) restrictions are (inevitably) lifted for Web-based retailers.

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