Amazon, Flipkart face qcom hurdle

GROWING BUSINESS

- PEERZADA ABRAR

Ecommerce majors Amazon and Flipkart, which are planning to scale up their quick commerce (qcom) operations, may need to invest at least $1 billion each over the next two-three years to catch up with established platforms, such as Zomato-owned Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, and Zepto, according to analysts.

Qcom refers to the delivery of consumer items within 10 to 30 minutes. In August, Walmart-owned Flipkart entered the growing qcom segment with Minutes. Amazon India plans to launch Tez in January. "They would have to invest at least $1 billion in the next 2-3 years because the other side is ready to deploy that kind of capital. If you think, "let's invest $25 million and see how it goes", then that will not work," said Satish Meena, an advisor at Datum Intelligence, a consumer technology-focused market research firm.

According to sources, 15 to 20-minute deliveries are taking a major share of sales, particularly in the grocery and household essentials categories, away from Flipkart and Amazon.

Analysts said it's only a matter of time before these qcom firms expand into premium categories like electronics and fashion, which have traditionally been dominated by Amazon and Flipkart.