E-commerce giant Amazon has acquired Indian social commerce startup GlowRoad. The all-cash deal comes as the e-commerce titan looks to strengthen its presence in one of its major foreign markets. Social commerce which is making an inroad in several global markets is a good choice to explore for a company like Amazon that wants to make a bigger push into its other foreign markets.
GlowRoad provides its users with goods at wholesale prices and helps with reselling them on social media platforms like Facebook and WhatsApp. The platform is easy to use and also provides its customers with logistics and payment services – the social commerce helps to deliver products and has the ability to collect cash. GlowRoad has a network of 6 million resellers who earn 35,000 Indian rupees on average every month. The social commerce startup announced expansion plans into the Southeast Asia region earlier this month and is looking to take over the region.
GlowRoad, which came into the scene four years ago, has raised more than $30 million from funding rounds and counts Accel, Vertex, Korea Investment Partners, and CDH as backers.
Amazon has invested more than $6.5 billion into its Indian operations and its latest acquisition of GlowRoad shows that there is a huge opportunity in the country. Per a spokesperson, the latest acquisition will help Amazon catalyze its plans and commitment to digitalize India’s 10 million businesses by 2025.
“Amazon continues to explore new ways to digitize India and delight customers, micro-entrepreneurs, and sellers, and bringing GlowRoad onboard is a key step in this direction. Together with GlowRoad, Amazon will help accelerate entrepreneurship among millions of creators, homemakers, students, and small sellers from across the country. This acquisition will complement GlowRoad’s already loved service with Amazon’s technology, infrastructure, and digital payments capabilities, bringing more efficiency and cost-saving for everyone,” Amazon said.
Co-founder Shekhar Sahu said that “GlowRoad is committed to creating more ‘homepreneurs’ and bringing many unique and unbranded suppliers to the platform. Even after four years, we have just scratched the surface, and there’s so much more to do.”
The terms of the deal were not disclosed.
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Ibhadojemu Lucky Emmanuel is a graduate of Education and Economics from the University of Benin. He has a passion for tech and business and has been writing professionally for over a period of five years. He's written across various topics and segments and knew tech-business was it when he first stumbled on it. He has a great passion for music and arts, and wants to visit as many countries as he can someday.
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