Amazon sees upbeat consumer sentiments lighting up festive demand

NEW DELHI: Amazon India is rolling up its sleeves for what it hopes will be a bumper festive season ahead, and expects demand this year to surpass last year's levels on upbeat consumer sentiments, according to the ecommerce company's Vice President of Operations Abhinav Singh. In an interview with PTI, Singh talked about the "long term" India opportunity, how Amazon looks at competition from other ecommerce firms and quick commerce upstarts and also refuted allegations of 'deep discounts' saying Amazon as a marketplace does not control pricing, which is purely a prerogative of sellers on the platform.

Singh declined to comment specifically on anti-trust investigation by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) but asserted that Amazon adheres to a high bar on compliance of laws.

Singh said Amazon considers India a "long term opportunity" with "huge" potential and a place where it is committed to building a large business, digitising millions of sellers, serving vast swathes of customers and creating a big network of entrepreneurs.

"It's a very long term opportunity, and it is a huge opportunity...Look at it from the perspective of a billion people, with an economy which is getting to be the third-largest very soon. So from that perspective, there's a lot going for India...that's very optimistic for me as an Indian, and that really excites me to work here, and help transform the digital infrastructure and contribute towards the government's Digital India mission," Singh said.

Ahead of the upcoming festive season, Amazon India is also sprucing up its logistics network and the network of fulfillment centres - the scaling of infrastructure and capacity building is aimed at accelerating delivery speeds and enabling sellers, by placing selection closer to customers.

Amazon recently announced that it has created more than 110,000 seasonal job opportunities across its operations network to meet the heightened customer demand during the upcoming festive season. These include direct and indirect jobs in cities such as Mumbai, Delhi, Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Lucknow, and Chennai, among others.

The company also recently signed an MoU with the Indian Railways to scale up the use of the railway network for faster movement of customer packages across the country. Over the last five years, since Amazon started working with the Indian Railways, there has been a 15-fold increase in the movement of Amazon India's parcels in railway lanes.

It is pertinent to mention that the ecommerce giant Amazon recently announced that Samir Kumar will take on the responsibility to lead India as its country manager, following the resignation of Manish Tiwary.

According to a leadership update by the company, Kumar is working closely with Manish Tiwary on the transition and will assume operational responsibilities for India starting October 1.

Asked about the charges of predatory pricing and deep discounts that have been levelled against the company, Singh claimed that Amazon as a marketplace does not control pricing, which is purely a prerogative of sellers.

"We have a very high bar on compliance, and we make sure that we do our best to comply to every single law of the land...in terms of the predatory pricing or deep discounts (allegations)...we don't control the pricing as a marketplace. Sellers decide to price the products at the level that they like to. So no, I don't have anything further to comment on this," he said.

The US ecommerce giant has been facing rising competitive intensity in India from players such as Flipkart and SoftBank-backed Meesho, as well as the onslaught of quick commerce firms like Blinkit and Zepto that are making aggressive inroads into the market as busy consumers opt for the convenience of instant delivery of grocery and many other household items.

Singh, however, said that the company's strategy is not being shaped or defined by competition, rather Amazon has a razor-sharp focus on customer experience and strengthening the network and infrastructure.

"...what we should be worried about is are we offering the best customer experience that we possibly can? And there is invention happening all around us, and we get inspired by that invention, we learn from it, and we want to make sure we remain the trusted marketplace which customers would come and buy from...and our focus is on the fastest selection at the fastest speed," Singh said.