In India has lately been seeing a lot of action in the e-commerce space - and it seems things are going to get louder and bigger.
StyleAdda.com, which plans to launch India's largest online shopping mall in January next, claims it is building the country's widest supplier network to support the 15-million-odd products it will list on the site.
"The project is extremely huge, [and] online retailing is all about managing the backend well. Internet customers demand quick service backed by exciting discounts. Online retailing does not bring in astonishing profit margins but if the customer loyalty is well-maintained, generating huge turnover is easy," said Rahul Malhotra, Vice Chairman of StyleAdda Retail India, in a company release.
StyleAdda.com has attracted private equity investors from Taiwan and Canada who may invest a total of $20 million or Rs98 crore in the mega project. However, claims the release, the total cost of development has already exceeded $25 million and may surpass $31 million.
StyleAdda.com plans to buy its own warehouses in metro cities of India and will set up its own logistic company.
Interestingly, the release says: "StyleAdda.com may have to go public immediately after the launch as it will have to clear the debts at earliest to make the business model profitable." It mentions that Nedra Partners, a PE firm from Taiwan, is in talks to buy out 11% stake for $8.77 million, valuing the project at $79.5 million.
It will be equally interesting to watch whether this is just for big valuations or will StyleAdda.com become a mecca for India's small but growing community of online shoppers. And yes, how the technology backend works.
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