Gupshup announces India’s first conversational buyer app for ONDC

Gupshup, a leading conversation cloud, has announced India’s first conversational buyer app on the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) network, according to a press release. The announcement was made at the flagship event Conversations 2024 in Delhi. This latest innovation is said to enable buyers to use a WhatsApp-based conversational UI to discover, browse, and buy products from sellers across the ONDC network, without needing to download any other mobile app. 

In future iterations, Gupshup has claimed that it will also offer this product capability to its enterprise customers that want to integrate conversational commerce into their chatbots.

Beerud Sheth, CEO, Gupshup said, “India’s diverse population uses different mobile tools, varied languages, and possesses different levels of tech-savvy. But they all know how to chat via WhatsApp. Delivering conversational experiences via the messaging app is the only way to reach everyone. Gupshup’s Buyer App on ONDC brings the vast commerce network to users nationwide, usable in any language, quickly and easily. This will truly transform digital commerce on a population scale in India.” 

The company claims that more than 650 million Indians are presently active on social media and messaging platforms however, only 30 per cent of the users shop online. The new innovation is set to change this user pattern.

“Gupshup Conversation Cloud makes it easy for businesses to build rich conversational commerce experiences with AI-powered natural language interactions, in any language, over text and voice, with deep personalization, across the entire customer lifecycle. This ONDC Buyer App is the perfect demonstration of the significant impact of conversational experiences and the unique ability of Gupshup’s platform to enable them”, said Gaurav Kachhawa, Chief Product Officer at Gupshup. 

As of now, the Buyer App is in Beta stage and will initially have limited availability, allowing users to order food and beverages on WhatsApp. Customers will be able to share their location over chat, browse sellers close to them, order food, and make payments right from WhatsApp. Support for additional conversational channels such as Google RCS and Voice will also be added soon. This is going to allow merchants and businesses looking to participate in the ONDC eCommerce ecosystem to leverage the Gupshup ONDC Commerce Platform and speed up their time to market. 

ONDC is a collaborative initiative that brings together various merchants and brands on a unified digital commerce platform. This interconnected network was developed by the Indian government's Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade. The primary goal of ONDC is to foster an open and inclusive e-commerce ecosystem in India.