 "Open Sesame! Alibaba may plan multiple tieups In India")
Chinese internet giant Alibaba Group may explore multiple partnerships with various players in India when it finally enters the market in the next few months, according to a source in the industry. In China, too, Alibaba has, over the years, entered into tieups with several companies across functions such as logistics, payments, e-commerce, etc, and it may work on similar lines in India as well.
Currently, Alibaba has passive investment in companies such as Paytm and Snapdeal. While it is still unclear when the company plans to make its entry into the Indian market, a strategic relationship with Paytm, which operates payment platform to e-commerce service, is not ruled out, it is learnt.
Alibaba, which hopes to make India its biggest market outside China, wants to bring the whole ecosystem into the country, not just e-commerce. Alibaba Group Holding Limited provides consumer-to-consumer Taobao, and business-to-business sales services via web portals. It also provides electronic payment services via Alipay and data-centric cloud computing services. It also owns an equivalent of YouTube and Twitter in China.
The company plans to be data-driven and use precision analytics to connect the dots between manufacturers, sellers, retailers and consumers.
Alibaba has been, till now, more of an investor in companies such as Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led Paytm, where it has investments amounting to $680 million. Paytm is honing its skills of running a payments bank at MyBank, run by Ant Financial Services Group, the financial affiliate of Alibaba Group Holding Limited. MyBank began operations of an online bank in June last year in China.
Alibaba investments in India
- Alibaba Group and subsidiary Ant Financial are the largest shareholders of One97 Communications, which runs Paytm
- Total investment pegged at $680 million; Alibaba and Ant Financial hold around 20% each in One97
- Paytm had struck a deal in February 2015 to raise $575 million from Ant Financial; later, in September, Alibaba and Ant Financial said they would invest an undisclosed amount in One97
- In August 2015, Snapdeal raised $500 million in a round led by Alibaba, Foxconn and SoftBank