Saturday, 20 April 2024
Facebook will spend $5.7 billion for 10% of Reliance Industries’s digital business, as the social media firm looks to leverage its popular WhatsApp messenger to offer digital payment services to small grocers in India.
The deal will help Reliance cut debt that has piled up in its push to secure top spot for its Jio Infocomm telco, and help boost its new online grocery marketplace JioMart.
India’s online grocery market is lucrative but competitive, with Amazon.com’s Pantry jostling for market share with Walmart’s Flipkart and BigBasket, backed by China’s Alibaba.
But a lot of untapped value lies in India’s kirana stores, or small grocers, lifeblood of the country’s $375 billion grocery industry, according to data from the Retailers Association of India.
“In the near future JioMart ... and WhatsApp will empower nearly 30 million small Indian kirana shops to digitally transact with every customer in their neighborhood,” Mukesh Ambani, Reliance’s billionaire CEO said in a video statement.
WhatsApp has 400 million users in India, its biggest market. It has been trying to secure approval to roll out its digital payment service in India, to compete with the likes of Google Pay
Aware of her elements, Neha writes the best articles across industries including electronics & semiconductors, automotive & transportation and food & beverages. Being from the finance background she has the ability to understand the dynamics of every industry and analyze the news updates to form insightful articles. Neha is an energetic person interested in music, travel, and entertainment. Since past 5 years, she written extensively on sectors like technology, finance and healthcare.
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