Flipkart expects 5-fold transactions under 'Big 10'

New Delhi: E-commerce major Flipkart expects to see a five-fold growth in transactions on its platform during its 'Big 10' sale that begins next week. The Big 10 sale, which is different from the flagship The Big Billion Days sale, will be held between May 14 and 18 to mark completion of 10 years of Flipkart's operations.

"We have been preparing for months for this sale. It is a big event for us. During the sale, we expect about 5X of the usual number of transactions we see on our platform on any given day," Flipkart Director Smrithi Ravichandran told PTI.

She added that the company has also expanded its back-end operations for logistics and last-mile delivery to ensure smooth operations during the sale days. Flipkart doesn't disclose number of transactions on its
platform.

The sale will see Flipkart offering deals on products across categories like fashion, smartphones, electronics, smart televisions and home decor. "We have expanded warehousing capacity. We have also added mom and pop stores as partners to ensure smooth last mile delivery," she said.

Interestingly, Flipkart's sale comes just after US-based rival Amazon's sale, something Ravichandran said was just coincidence. Amazon has commenced sale from today which will last till May 14.

Both companies are aggressively investing into the Indian market, expanding their infrastructure and platform to bring more sellers and shoppers on board. In April, Flipkart received a funding of USD 1.4 billion from eBay, Microsoft, and Tencent, while Amazon has also pledged investments worth USD 5 billion into the Indian market.

According to a Google-AT Kearney report, the number of online shoppers in India is estimated to grow 3.5 times to touch 175 million by 2020, from 50 million in 2015. Also, e-tailing is expected to drive 25 per cent of the total organised retail sales of USD 240 billion in India by 2020, as per the report.