E-commerce firms switch from online to offline strategy to get ahead in Indian market
This week say Aditya Birla Group shut down e-commerce site Abof and move back to its offline retail business, while Amazon acquired stake in Shoppers Stop in exchange for offline presence.
Key highlights:
- Abof.com announced that it will shut down its operations by the end of the year
- Abof is the second e-commerce venture that Aditya Birla has closed after Trendin.com
- Shoppers Stop announced that Amazon had invested Rs 179.25 crore in the company
Tough times still prevail in the e-commerce industry. While the festive sales still continue, it is now down to two major players Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart and US-based Amazon in the race to win the Indian. Yet the big discounts still continue despite both of them nowhere close to reaching the break-even point in the country, forget about profitability.
This week itself we saw one more e-commerce players throw in the hat. Abof.com, Aditya Birla Group's flagship e-commerce site announcement that it will shut down its operations by the end of the year.
The company said that looking at big and long term e-commerce businesses continuing to struggle and are unlikely to make money for some time. For this reason it said it did not seem logical to continue as if everything is all right in the sector.
Abof is the second e-commerce venture that Aditya Birla has closed after Trendin.com wound up last year for the same reason.
Amazon to invest Rs 179.25 cr in Shoppers Stop
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