E-marketplace Flipkart and parent company Walmart jointly announced their second round of investment amounting $30 million in Ninjacart, a business-to-business (B2B) tech-driven supply chain platform that connects farmers of fresh vegetables and fruits with kiranas and businesses.
Earlier in December 2019, Walmart and the Flipkart Group made their first investment, with the companies focussing on the grocery and fresh produce segments.
Partnering with Flipkart and Walmart will give Ninjacart access to a wider customer base, the company said. The logistics start-up has leading private equity investors such as Tiger Global, Accel, Tanglin, Steadview, Syngenta, Nandan Nilekani and Qualcomm among its backers.
According to Flipkart, the Ninjakart partnership will help enhance offerings in the grocery segment and scale up its hyperlocal model—FlipkartQuick. Especially, when online grocery sector is flourishing due to the COVID Pandemic, and entry of JIO Mart has spurred the competition.
The two have already worked on various pilot projects during the Covid lockdown, such as apartment deliveries which also included a ‘Farm to fork’ pilot with Flipkart.
“The e-grocery market in India has seen tremendous growth over the past several months as people have increasingly taken to ordering groceries and fresh produce online. We will continue to make investments to offer the best produce to our customers and support livelihoods and sustainable growth for local farmers, producers and the supply chain ecosystem. Our pilots and current business engagement with Ninjacart have been encouraging as we leverage technology to address changing consumer behaviour across the country.”
~ Kalyan Krishnamurthy, chief executive officer, Flipkart Group.
As per the joint statement from Flipkart and Walmart, the deal is expected to be closed by the end of October 2020.
