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All you Need to Know About FAANG Stocks

Shalmoli Sarkar — Sat, 23 Oct 2021 08:35:41 +0000

Initially, it was simply FANG and not FAANG. It was during 2013. when Jim Cramer coined the term FANG stocks which is a collective term for the stocks of the world’s leading technology behemoths – Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google. In 2017, Apple joined the bandwagon to be renamed FAANG.

Since, the outbreak of the pandemic that confined people to their homes, the dependence on OTT platforms, social media, and digitisation of businesses soared resulting in the rallying of these stocks thereby attracting several investors to buy shares of these tech companies.

What makes FAANG stocks popular in India?

Indian investors in India want to build a portfolio that has investments in the foreign market. Investing in a different economy can be beneficial since every economy has its weaknesses and strengths and not all economies become weak at the same time. The stock market here presents a true picture of a nation’s economy. Most Indian investors spread their investments in foreign stock markets mainly in the US financial markets to diversify their portfolio and cushion the risks that might be associated with the Indian stock markets.

The FAANG stocks are the stocks of such companies that are leading in technological advancements that have changed the definition of interacting, socializing, shopping and entertainment and own an expansive consumer base globally. Moreover, in the wake of the pandemic, the companies from FAANG have further revamped their products and offerings and with artificial intelligence, cloud, and machine learning to suit the needs of the new virtual workforce thereby pushing the demand and proving the investment in these stocks to be lucrative.

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FAANG stocks is a collective term for the stocks of the world’s leading technology behemoths – Facebook, Amazon,Apple, Netflix, and Google.

How can Indians invest in FAANG stocks?

Under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme (LRS) of RBI, every Indian individual can invest overseas upto $250,000 each year. Indians wanting to invest in FAANG stocks can do so from their broking account if the broking firm offers overseas trading services.

Also, consider the following data of the recent FAANG stock prices at an exchange rate of Rs 75.32.

Facebook : Rs 24,357
Amazon : Rs 255,675
Apple: Rs 10,800
Netflix: Rs 47,100
Google: Rs 212,025

From the above stock prices of FAANG, it is quite evident that the stocks are expensive. To own a share from each company one needs to invest a massive Rs 5.49 lakh. To solve this, some broking firms or trading platforms provide a fractional trading facility where one can buy less than one share as well, which means they can be the shareholder of 0.00001 shares of FAANG.

Otherwise, the second manner to invest in FAANG stocks can be through the mutual fund route to invest overseas. Several fund houses have launched schemes to invest in the foreign markets along with India.

Word of advice for the investors

Investing in the US markets might seem an uphill task but an informed decision backed by proper research can help in doing so. Investing in FAANG stocks can be profitable since the companies are well-established and are safe to invest in. This also goes without saying that one should always assess their risk-appetite level. In addition to this, one must keep a tab on inflation and interest rates, Fed reserve policies and growth rates across geographies since these factors influence the currency movements.

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Amazon Denies Plans to Accept Bitcoin, What Does This Mean?

Aakash Sharma — Wed, 28 Jul 2021 12:35:08 +0000

Amazon Inc. posted a job opening for a digital currency and blockchain product lead on July 22, 2021. This led to speculations across industry experts and media circles that Amazon has finally started on its path toward accepting cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin as a payments mode for the transactions on its e-commerce platform. But yesterday, the e-commerce and retail giant denied such media reports.

The report about Amazon’s acceptance of Bitcoin by the year-end published by some of the most prominent news groups sent the world’s biggest cryptocurrency up as much as 14.5% before it trimmed gains to last trade 6% higher at $37,684.04.

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As per an Amazon spokesperson, notwithstanding the company's interest in the space, the speculation that has ensued around its specific plans for cryptocurrencies is not true.

However, the e-retail giant remains focused on exploring what such a move could look like for customers shopping on Amazon without a particular timeline.

Not Amazon, but other big companies have already embraced Cryptocurrencies

Bitcoin adoption as a payment option for businesses is proliferating. This acceptance is bringing the previously untrusted and looked-down-upon cryptocurrencies closer to significant financial inclusion. Fast-food chains, major tech companies, and even auction houses are embracing cryptocurrencies.

Tesla Inc., Elon Musk’s leading electric vehicle company, has announced plans to accept Bitcoin as a payment method after carefully researching the amount of renewable energy used to mine the coin. More and more companies, including PayPal and Xbox, accept Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as a means of payment, and others are evaluating their options. Starbucks and Microsoft are other big names that have taken a big step forward.

What are the benefits of Cryptocurrencies as the Payment method?

The main attraction of cryptocurrency for many businesses and users is the autonomy that digital currency gives. They can control the use of money without intermediaries such as banks or governments. Although cryptocurrency exchanges generally charge the “manufacturer” and “consignee” fees, along with potential deposit and withdrawal fees, cryptocurrency users are not restricted by traditional bank fees. This means, among other things, that there is no minimum account maintenance or balance, no current account costs, and no refundable deposits.

Like many online payment modes, crypto users can pay for their coins wherever they have Internet access. This means that purchasers never have to visit a bank or a store to buy a product. The fact that some of the world’s biggest companies are embracing crypto-trade and people are also jumping on this digital bandwagon is proof enough to show the potential of this future mainstream currency.

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Over 75000 Small Businesses Will Make Their Amazon Prime Day Debut

Anju Nambiar — Wed, 21 Jul 2021 03:35:07 +0000

Amazon is determined to amplify small businesses in India. The recently concluded ‘Small business day’ event followed by the upcoming Prime Day is testimony to the fact that the tech giant won’t rest until it has done everything to revive India’s small business sector.

What is Amazon Prime Day?

Prime Day is an online shopping event to be hosted by Amazon between the 26th and 27th of July 2021. It’s a sale event exclusively for Indian shoppers with Prime subscription. This year, Prime Day is significant because it will showcase unique products by small businesses who are listed as sellers on Amazon. Customers will enjoy huge deals and discounts and can browse through regional and handmade products by these small business sellers.

Who is Amazon Prime Day for?

Target consumers for the Amazon Prime Day sale are mainly member shoppers with the Prime subscription. The sale is mainly targeted towards smartphone and consumer goods shoppers. Through this event, Amazon is focused on increasing its Prime membership and subscriptions base. The event is also encouraging small and medium business (SMB) sellers to showcase their wares and take advantage of Amazon’s flagship sale.

Amazon’s initiatives for small businesses

Amazon Launchpad

An initiative that’s part of Prime Day’s push for small businesses, Amazon Launchpad will showcase products driven by innovation from up-and-coming brands.

Amazon Karigar

Amazon Karigar will shed light on sellers listing handmade products like handloom and handicrafts. Artisans and Government Emporiums can join the Amazon Karigar initiative to sell their wares.

Amazon Saheli

Through Amazon Saheli, women entrepreneurs can sell their products. The major categories for products on Amazon Saheli include Clothing, Home Décor, grocery, kids and party supplies by women-led businesses.

Local shops

Local stores will be featured for Amazon Prime Day and verified local shops can target customers in their vicinity with unique product offerings.

Contribution and Coverage by SMB sellers

More than 2400 products will be launched by small businesses for the Prime Day catalogue. As part of the ‘Local shops’ initiative, over 75,000 local seller shops spread across 450 cities in India will be debuting on Amazon. Over 100 small and medium businesses including start-ups, women entrepreneurs, artisans and weavers will be featured on the two prime days.

Prominent categories covered by sellers include home and kitchen, fashion, beauty, jewellery, stationery, lawn and garden, grocery and electronics. Over 50% of the sellers belong to Tier II and III cities. The Amazon Saheli initiative will feature over 90000 products from women-led businesses whereas Amazon Karigar will feature about 272 unique handicrafts.

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This year, Prime Day is significant because it will showcase unique products by small businesses who are listed as sellers on Amazon.

What’s in it for me?

Through such initiatives by Amazon and other aggregators towards empowering the small business community in India, it is clear that E-commerce is now an amplifier for small business. Local Kirana stores are clearly taking their business online. The absolute small entrepreneurs like local artisans and weavers are adopting e-commerce at an accelerated pace. With local neighbourhood shops joining the e-commerce foray, it is evident that the need for e-commerce is indisputable for small businesses.

With the aggregator’s help, you can position your products from a very strong standpoint and attract big spenders online. Small businesses can be on Amazon even on non-sale days because consumer spends are high on most days. SMBs can revive by acquiring a sizeable chunk of the average consumer spends. Consumer technology and consumer goods have high demand during online sale events and these businesses have a high chance at gaining traction through e-commerce. E-commerce is the biggest hope for small businesses to unlock national and global demand. You need very little investment to scale up on e-commerce.

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Learnings from Amazon Small Business Day 2021

DU Desk — Tue, 20 Jul 2021 08:35:07 +0000

It’s not just the government, even start-ups and big tech giants are actively trying to help the small business fraternity. Amazon is a small business friendly platform where a seller located in any location in India can open their store and sell to customers across India. But due to the intense competition on platforms like Amazon, a lot of small businesses fail to show up on the first page of search results or make profitable sales. As a solution to this, Amazon organises the ‘Small Business Days’ event which took place towards the end of 2020 and has recently concluded for the year 2021. This event is in line with national efforts to provide a technological leg up to the thousands of small-scale entrepreneurs whose livelihoods have been wiped out due to the pandemic.

About the Amazon Small Business Day 2021

The Amazon Small Business Day 2021 took place between the 2^nd and 4^th July 2021. As the name rightly suggests, it was an exclusive event by Amazon India to support small businesses registered on their platform. By encouraging shoppers to make big purchases during these days, Amazon did its bit to boost sales and revenue for the local and small business community.

Why is Amazon hosting the Small Business Days event?

Amazon is doubling up on its efforts to help small businesses survive and revive post the second wave. As such, they hosted the ‘Small Business Days’ event for a duration of 3 days to generate business for the beneficiaries.

Beneficiaries of the event – Types of small businesses, their locations

Local and pan India small businesses were the prime beneficiaries of the event. Local entrepreneurs, homegrown sellers, manufacturers, start-ups, brands, women entrepreneurs, artisans, regional weavers, local stores were invited to list their products. Unique sellers like Indian craft makers were introduced during the event and given a platform to make a fresh start for their business.

The Numbers Game

A total of 84000 SMEs have benefitted from record sales during the 3-day period. The statistics are empowering for small town sellers since 68% of the orders received were from sellers who belonged to non-metro cities in India. A total of 7500 sellers who were participants of the event witnessed their highest single day sale in this year’s ‘Small Business Days’ by Amazon. This year, there was a 2.8X increase in their orders when compared to the SBD sale conducted by Amazon in December of 2020. A total of 1700 local shops who participated received at least one order during the event. The Karigar sellers who were part of the ‘Amazon Karigar’ initiative contributed 3400 new products to the catalogue. The women entrepreneurs who were part of the SBD’s ‘Amazon Saheli’ initiative added 8000 new products to the catalogue.

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By encouraging shoppers to make big purchases during these days, Amazon did its bit to boost sales and revenue for the local and small business community.

What’s in it for me?

Events like ‘Small Business Days’ are a once-a-year opportunity for small businesses to get the limelight. By participating in such annual sales hosted by e-commerce aggregators, you get the opportunity to showcase your unique collection of products. The exposure obtained from the sale days will be beneficial for businesses struggling to acquire customers. You can earn rewards since customers are actively shopping to avail big deals and special offers during these days.

The numbers are staggering, and small businesses can immensely benefit from Amazon’s reach. While this year’s sale has already concluded, keep an eye out for similar events by other well-known e-commerce aggregators. Support and resources are provided by aggregators to list profitably during sale days. For instance, you can manage your inventory, prepare fulfilment centres, organise digital marketing campaigns, and automate your pricing strategy through Amazon’s platform. Participating in e-commerce aggregator sales and events, especially focused on small businesses will be your first or most important step in digitally transforming your business.

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How to Identify Fake Products on your E-Commerce Platform?

Shalmoli Sarkar — Thu, 13 May 2021 11:00:09 +0000

Shenzhen Jiayz Photo Industrial Ltd., the parent company of BOYA wireless microphones and accessories, has filed a petition in the Delhi High Court against e-commerce sites Flipkart, Amazon India, Paytm Mall, Tata Cliq, and Snapdeal for allegedly selling fake versions of its products.

Such cases are just the tip of the iceberg.

There are various instances on social media where people have expressed their anger and resentment towards receiving fake products. Repeated incidents of receiving such fake products tend to erode the brand reputation and consumer trust. This results in loss of revenues which is detrimental to the e-commerce businesses especially in the pandemic where people are most likely to shop from online platforms.

The size of fake and counterfeit products, according to Acviss- a technology company that uses algorithms to protect consumers and brands from experiencing counterfeit products- is a massive Rs 20,000 crore industry, which is roughly less than 0.37 percent of the total retail pie in India. The size is quite alarming for e-commerce businesses. According to ASPA (Authentication Solutions Providers Association), fake and counterfeit products cause revenue losses worth Rs 1 lakh crore annually in India.

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The size of fake and counterfeit products, according to Acviss- is a massive Rs 20,000 crore industry in India.

Reasons Behind the Growth of Fake Products on E-Commerce Platforms

Lack of visibility, traceability, and transparency in the existing supply chain network from manufacturing to point of sale is making room for fake products.

In e-commerce marketplaces, the detection of counterfeit and fake products is cumbersome since orders are accepted by the e-tailers and are shipped directly by suppliers. There is no such body that inspects the goods that are being supplied by the suppliers.

This holds the e-retailers responsible for the quality and authenticity of products and ends up with negative reviews of customers receiving the counterfeit or fake product.

Amazon’s Project Zero to fight fake products

E-commerce giant Amazon was troubled with the menace of fake products largely due to the size and scale of its third-party marketplace that went unregulated. The e-commerce major decided to tackle the fake product menace with its Project Zero initiative which ensured that the customers received authentic goods while shopping on its platform.

More than 7000 global brands are associated with Amazon’s Project Zero initiative across the US, Europe, and Japan, with pilot tests being launched in India to test Project Zero.

How Amazon’s Project Zero Works

Amazon’s Project Zero, as the name suggests, aims to have zero tolerance towards fake products on its platform through its Machine Learning (ML) capabilities consisting of three powerful tools:

Automated protections
Self-service counterfeit removal tool
Product serialisation.

Brands to counter their fake versions will associate with Project Zero to submit trademarks, logos, and intellectual property data with Amazon, which in turn will be used by Project Zero to automatically detect fake or counterfeit products.

Amazon’s machine learning-backed automated protections will continuously scan its site that displays a myriad of 5 billion product listing updates per day, for detection of any suspected counterfeits.

The self-service counterfeit tool gives brands the autonomy to directly remove products impersonating as original from Amazon’s store that otherwise required to file a counterfeit report first with Amazon to take action. This information is shared with the company’s automated protections enabling Amazon to catch potential fake product listings proactively in the future.

Project zero’s product serialisation will allow Amazon to scan and receive confirmation about the authenticity of a brand’s products being purchased on the site. It assigns a unique code for each manufactured unit, that is put on products during the manufacturing process. When the product is ordered, Amazon scans this unique code to verify if the product being bought is authentic. If not, Amazon can detect and stop a counterfeit item before it reaches the customer.

Is Project Zero Free for Brands?

Project Zero enrollment is free for brands however, brands that will use the product serialisation service will incur costs.

Other technologies to Counter Fake Products Being Sold

Blockchain technology is another solution. Its characteristic of distributed ledger technology is widely being used in the fashion industry to establish transparency, security and authenticity in products thus saving the livelihoods of designers and restoring the trust of end consumers. Many global fashion and luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Prada, Zara are implementing blockchain technology in the process.

During the development of a product, the RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tags are attached to the raw materials and are scanned at various stages right from its production to packaging to confirm the genuineness and authenticity of the product. The RFID tags, when scanned, execute a smart contract where multiple trusted nodes verify the information to be correct before the update goes on record in the blockchain ledger. Each entry in the blockchain ledger is protected and encrypted that deters fraud.

How should small businesses go about it?

For Small Businesses who Sell on E-commerce Platforms

Fake or counterfeit products will create irate and unhappy customers whose trust regarding your brand will erode resulting in refunds and exchanges eventually causing a drop in revenues. Hence, small businesses who are sellers on e-commerce giants Amazon should enroll themselves with Project Zero.

For E-commerce Businesses

Independent D2C e-commerce can invest in blockchain or ML technologies to make the entire supply and operations under its radar, therefore, protecting the business from selling fake products.

This will make your e-commerce platform secure and increase user’s trust. Sellers and Buyers using your platform will choose you over other options in the market. Hence, you will be ahead of the competition and increase the number of loyal customers. You might also be able to expand your user base with new sellers and buyers when they are influenced by the existing happy users.

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Are Cashierless Supermarkets the Future of Retail?

Aakash Sharma — Tue, 13 Apr 2021 12:32:18 +0000

Businesses and start-ups around the world are opening retail stores that don’t require a human presence. Yes, you read that right. Many retail sector players are heavily investing resources in this hybrid model, from start-ups in China and India to the American retail giant Amazon.

In 2018, Chinese start-up BingoBox opened a cashierless supermarket store and now has more than 300 stores in 30 cities across China. In 2019, HyperCity opened two cashierless stores on the Infosys Hyderabad campus with the support of a Bangalore-based start-up.

So far, Amazon Go has been the only major player in the retail industry’s cashierless supermarket segment. Amazon Go is functional in the United States and the United Kingdom as a cashierless retail chain operated by Amazon. The Amazon Go cashierless supermarkets are partially automated, and customers buy cashless products using self-automated checkout terminals. These stores use advanced technology to collect important information, such as the customer’s height, weight, and purchase data.

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The concept of cashierless supermarkets is seen as a revolutionary model that leverages smartphone and geolocation technology's popularity to simplify the customer experience, supply chain management, and inventory.

Who are Amazon Go’s competitors?

Amazon isn’t alone in changing the cashierless supermarkets and retail game. The competition for the leaderboard in this futuristic retail segment is fierce, especially for new players to speed up the game. Chinese conglomerate Alibaba designed its unique business model, and cashierless supermarkets experience through its Hema grocery store brand. Launched in 2015, Hema uses a new retail business model that integrates both online and offline products and services.

In India, Watasale is a new age cashierless supermarket based in Kochi. It has a fully automated cashless store inspired by Amazon Go. Customers can select and place items in the store, and the costs are automatically deducted from their e-wallet. Users need to download the Watasale app on their phone and then log in with their email address and phone number. The application provides a QR code as an identifier and a “ticket” for the company. The user needs to scan the password and log in to the store.

Other cashierless supermarkets and retailers include San Francisco-based Standard Cognition, Trigo Vision of Israel, Netherlands-based Albert Heijn.

Cashierless Supermarkets: Technology and Implementation

Cashierless supermarkets use various technologies, including computer vision, intensive learning algorithms, built-in sensors for hardware purchases, and digital payments and transactions. The concept of cashierless supermarkets is seen as a revolutionary model that leverages smartphone and geolocation technology’s popularity to simplify the customer experience, supply chain management, and inventory.

Businesses use iOS and Android apps linked to customer accounts for commodities sales, transactions and payments. The app is needed to enter the store with turnstiles that scan a QR code produced on the app.

In hardware technology, these stores use dozens of cameras on the roofs and weight sensors on store shelves to detect users’ products. When a customer takes something off the shelf, it is added to the user’s virtual shopping cart. When the user puts it back on the shelf, it is also removed from the user’s virtual shopping cart.

The most successful player yet, Amazon Go, added an intelligent shopping cart called the Dash Cart to their new store in Los Angeles. The basket automatically identifies the items placed and calculates the total costs using the camera, scale, weight sensor and image processing tools.

Cons of Cashierless Supermarkets

With turnstiles in cashierless supermarkets, the automatic door that only allows one person to pass at a check-in location, companies hope to eliminate the point of contact between the consumer and the store employees. Once the person behind the counter is replaced by this tech, businesses’ economic savings will increase dramatically, and unemployment will grow with it significantly.

Amazon Go’s project carried out in Seattle showed the extent to which technology can be a threat to some professions. It must be said that, for everything else, there are still physical employees, such as storeroom workers and stock clerks, which robots may not have difficulty replacing sooner or later, perhaps even mingling with humans.

On the technological front, one of the critical cons that have reportedly hindered launches of cashierless supermarkets is issues with the sensors’ ability to track aggregated users within the store, such as when children move items to other counters or when more than one consumer has similar body habitués.

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How does Indian Retail Start-Up Perpule Help Offline Stores Go Online?

Aakash Sharma — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 06:35:04 +0000

In today’s economic climate, digitisation has more impact than ever, and start-ups are leading this digital revolution. A newly added retail tech start-up to the list of acquisitions by e-commerce giant Amazon is Bengaluru-based start-up – Perpule. Perpule is bettering the way to shop offline using new-age online solutions.

Founded by engineers from leading Indian universities, Perpule received its first external funding from the Kalari Capital in 2016. It has evolved from a single store in India to over 100 stores and several cafes, including IT giant Infosys and many others.

Perpule is a start-up that aims to make the profitability of mobile applications more transparent. According to the company’s mission information, it offers “the most actionable mobile app data and insights” for retail businesses (groceries, F&B, clothing, etc.). Company founders Abhinav Pathak, Saketh BSV and Yogesh Ghaturle hope to bring a swift and easy mobile retail experience to as many people as possible. And Perpule is very much on its way to attaining that goal, as Amazon’s acquired the company for Rs 108 crore last week.

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With the advent of large-scale production of SaaS by many large companies such as Shopify, AWS, etc., the task of building applications has become more accessible.

Perpule is facilitating commercial cooperation of the retail industry

The first product of this start-up, launched in late 2016, was designed to help consumers avoid lines at market places such as Shoppers Stop and Big Bazaar. Perpule offers offline retailers a point of sale machine that allows them to accept digital payments and is available in many payment apps stores in India, including PayTM, PhonePe and Google Pay. The company has developed a cloud-based point-of-sale offering that enables offline stores in India better to manage inventory, payment processes and overall user experience.

Perpule founders (left to right): Yogesh Ghaturle, Saketh BSV and Abhinav Pathak

Start-of-the-art Technology used by Perpule

This Bangalore-based start-up has snowballed in recent years, giving SaaS like StoreSE that allow a company to fulfil its corporate mandates like bulk ordering and cost-saving on retail. The company’s broad and scalable vision has played a vital role in its multi-million dollar acquisition by Amazon.

Fundamentally, Perpule is a joint engagement and automation product that retailers can use to improve their return on investment (ROI) and provide a better customer experience. While building the self-checkouts shopping journey for the customers has created a super-strong OMS that can cater to both in-store and online shopping requirements.

Perpule Fair – Simple Application for Merchants

Like the simple OMS application interface, the “Purple Fair” application can also meet retailers and small businesses’ dynamic needs. The application is a simple billing and payment app that retailers can use to scan stock barcodes, connect customer data, make purchasing decisions and orders. The app also includes a payment section, and merchants can create online payment and debit cards through the Purple Fair app. After payment, it also has a digital Goods and Services (GST) tax billing module, which can reduce printer and other expenses.

In general, thanks to this system, all retailers- small and large- can use their mobile phones to collect payments and generate invoices digitally through local platforms, invoice counters, and barcode readers.

What can others learn from this story?

With the advent of large-scale production of SaaS by many large companies such as Shopify, AWS, etc., the task of building applications has become more accessible. In a country like India, what remains a challenge is making people use it and inspiring them with the benefits of such solutions. When the users are highly non- mobile-savvy, which is the case in India’s millions of Kirana and local shops, a key strategy is needed to tap the billions of dollars worth, new market.

Start-ups like Perpule spend a lot of time learning about the vast SME retail market – economically, demographically, psychologically and socially- to find what the real India shops and how to design products that SMEs could quickly adapt to. If you are a start-up in this sector or a wannapreneur for this business, you can surely start by following this company’s lead as the potential to grow is immense.

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How is Amazon Transforming the Face of Offline Kirana Stores in Pandemic?

Aakash Sharma — Mon, 05 Apr 2021 12:35:04 +0000

Perpule is a customisable e-commerce platform with which retailers use to connect to internet-based retail solutions. The start-up’s acquisition will allow Amazon to offer new products to small retailers across the country using its existing network and newly acquired tech solutions.

Founded in September 2016 by Saketh BSV, Yogesh Ghaturle and Abhinav Pathak, Perpule is a customised e-commerce platform that allows small retailers to enter the digital space. It used an indigenous cloud-based point of sale technology named Ultra POS, which small businesses can manage inventory, distribute orders and organise receipts from suppliers, among other everyday retail functionalities.

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Amazon's project for Indian retailers helps clients transform their local businesses into digital businesses by providing more functionality, faster delivery and other value-added services.

What is Amazon eyeing with Perpule’s acquisition?

Amazon launched its “Local Store” programme for India more than a year ago in January 2020. And this deal with Perpule will help it enter the offline retailers’ market to help them open up digital setups. The e-commerce giant will expand its local store programme from 50,000 offline retailers in March 2021 to 100,000 by the end of the year using the newly acquired technology.

Cloud-based sales systems are often used on mobile devices and are sometimes referred to as the point of sale (software) rather than just an element of SaaS. They are also called EPOS (Electronic Point of Sale), which reflects that the program works on electronic devices. Perpule’s cloud-based Ultra POS helps small businesses, retailers, and grocery stores automate retail functions like digital management and pricing. With this acquisition, Amazon could offer a new range of technological products to its partners as the retail sector’s digitalisation is underway.

Amazon’s increasing interest in Indian retail through Kirana and Local Stores

In January 2020, president, CEO and chairman of the board Jeff Bezos announced that Amazon would invest $1.1 billion in India to support small and medium companies (SMBs, SMEs and MSMEs) going digital all the way. Bezos said the company would allow retailers to export more than products worth $10 billion across the world by 2025. The e-commerce giant relies heavily on the ‘Amazon Local Store’ programme to help strengthen local retailers and sales in line with digital solutions.

Over the past six months, Amazon has launched a pilot programme with more than 5,000 local retailers and stores to make the benefits of online sales more accessible. The areas covered in the test programme include Delhi-NCR, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, Surat, Indore Lucknow, Saharanpur, Faridabad, Kota, Varanasi, among others.

The layout includes sellers in various categories such as kitchen, home, furniture, clothing, automotive, beauty, electronics, sports, groceries, lawns and gardens, books, toys and jewellery. The project helps clients transform their local businesses into digital businesses by providing more functionality, faster delivery and other value-added services. Amazon has pledged Rs 10 crore to resellers and retailers who want to join the program to expand the reach of the test quickly.

The Way Ahead has a Significant Ground for SMBs, MSMEs and Small Retail Businesses

With the recent acquisition of Perpule, Amazon now has the opportunity to expand its presence to the vast network of Indian Kiranas. Following the coronavirus pandemic outbreak, all industries in the country have started to restructure and reorganise their activities, and the retail sector wants to accelerate its growth even more.

As the pandemic looms large, e-commerce companies are advised to deliver only essential items to consumers by de facto notices. Amazon has developed a personalised delivery app for consumers and local stores to provide accurate delivery updates. The lakhs of grocery and Kirana stores in thousands of cities and towns across India are the new target of Amazon. The giant is betting its billions on saving and growing the Indian retail and churning more enormous profits for itself.

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New Investors in Beauty, Health, and Wellness

Anju Nambiar — Thu, 25 Mar 2021 08:35:06 +0000

Towards the end of 2020, we saw how Beauty, Health, and Wellness brands managed to attract the interest of large investors. This new interest by big investors in the BH&W sector stems from the fact that a few big returns that were on par with those coming from tech investments were seen.

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D2C Beauty brands have been through several funding rounds towards the end of 2020 and in 2021 as well.

Amazon: The new beauty investor on the block.

Clearly there already are new investors in this block, what with Amazon coming in as a first-time investor into the Indian beauty start-up scene. Many more new investors are sure to follow in Amazon’s footsteps.

The start-up we’re talking about is ‘MyGlamm’, which up until now was a less-known beauty brand. In its recent Series C funding round, MyGlamm received INR 175 Cr backed by Ascent Capital and Wipro Consumer Care Ventures accompanied by Amazon, of course.

Amazon is a new investor in beauty, health, and wellness, and start-ups in this sector need to prepare to gain Amazon on your investors board which will open many doors.

D2C start-ups like MyGlamm can hope to gain Amazon’s attention. After the funding, MyGlamm is now valued at $100 M.

B&W: The new favourite among VC and Private Equity Investors

The Female Founders Fund (FFF) has expressed that the Beauty & Wellness sector has become a new favourite of Venture Capitalists, Investors, and Equity Firms in the recent past.

D2C Beauty brands have been through several funding rounds towards the end of 2020 and in 2021 as well. Only recently ‘Juice Chemistry’ another D2C Beauty Brand like MyGlamm and a direct competitor to the latter managed to raise $6.3 M in a Series A funding round backed by ‘Verlinvest’, a Belgium-based investment firm.

As mentioned earlier, investment companies like Verlinvest are increasingly looking towards digital beauty brands like Juice Chemistry and MyGlamm with a unique proposition.

The post-lockdown period has proved to be profitable for beauty and wellness start-ups which has attracted investor interest.

VC’s like Verlinvest have an extensive portfolio with D2C beauty brands like JuiceChemistry being the new entrant to the list.

Consumer oriented investment firms interested in Health & Wellness:

Big names in the consumer sector are showing keen interest in Health & Wellness investments owing to their rising popularity. This was seen recently when ‘Wipro Consumer Care Ventures’, the VC subsidiary of the legacy FMCG giant ‘Wipro Consumer Care & Lighting’ invested an undisclosed amount into ‘OneLife Nutriscience’, a Health & Wellness company.

The Health & Wellness sector has been booming ever since the pandemic broke out owing to the renewed consciousness among people regarding nutritional products. Since Health & Wellness digital-first brands are increasingly becoming popular among legacy VC’s and investors, start-ups planning to set up e-commerce stores selling these products can expect to receive funding by these big names.

What’s in it for me?

Beauty, Health & Wellness brands both big and small have great hope of getting investments by big VC’s. Technology oriented start-ups in these sectors are particularly sought-after by the big investors owing to their potential to maximize sales, marketing, and even brand presence through digital technologies.

Start-ups in these sectors need to think of innovation whether in their business model, products/services, or even branding exercises to attract these large investors.

Start-ups in Beauty, Health, & Wellness should aim to create a loyal customer base so that big VC’s can view them as a high-return prospect also with convenient exit potential.

The post New Investors in Beauty, Health, and Wellness appeared first on Dutch Uncles.

Amazon’s Game Changing Innovations

Naina Sood — Sat, 27 Feb 2021 06:35:04 +0000

From cloud computing to e-readers, online grocery shopping, video streaming, and gaming, Amazon has worked its way through various stages of development. Since its inception, it has been serving a diverse portfolio of customer value propositions and now there is no escaping from Amazon in the digital economy.

Top 5 Effective Innovations by Amazon

The main reason why the giant, who has been in business for 26 years and counting, is so effective and relevant is innovation and experiments with new trends and technologies. We listed out few innovative ways Amazon has changed lives:

Prime

This was an offer you could not refuse. With Amazon Prime, the company became the default provider for virtually everything. The formula was simple yet most disruptive. If I am comfortable with online shopping, why wouldn’t I pay $99/year for free and fast shipping. Now that I have paid for the privilege, I am going to use it again and again for all it is worth. Suddenly, it was not about free shipping anymore. The company made Prime valuable to its customers by offering movies, music, free photo storage and more. By tying these services to Prime, Amazon was able to incentivise people to adopt the company’s own services and absorb their original content.

Prime Now & Prime Air

The company continued to upgrade and work to make shipping even faster with Prime Now which enables individuals to get certain Amazon items in two hours for free or in one hour for $7.99. This doesn’t stop here. Sometime in the near future, Amazon customers will be able to receive their Prime orders in 30 minutes or less as they would be delivered using unmanned aerial vehicles, also called drones. Your future Amazon packages could be delivered by a flying robot through Prime Air.

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The AWS success story has redefined tech industry in such a way that it has radically altered the business blueprints of some of the biggest names in the history of technology.

Kindle & Kindle Fire

Amazon came out with its first consumer device-Kindle, an e-book reader. The device is an example of innovation in the retail book market using a system-based solution. While it wasn’t the first e-reader out there, it helped usher in e-books after several other failed attempts to popularise the format. Then came Kindle Fire with more digital screen and less-paper-like. Amazon also introduced Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) which helped thousands of authors get published.

Alexa

Everyone who has brought Alexa into their homes has gotten hooked. This virtual assistant AI technology developed by Amazon, is capable of voice interaction, music playback, making to-do lists, setting alarms, streaming podcasts, playing audiobooks, and providing weather, traffic, sports and much more. Amazon has opened up Alexa to the masses with Alexa Skill Blueprints and integrated the digital assistant even more with families.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

AWS reinvented the way IT was done. It is a collection of remote computing services that together make up a cloud computing platform, offered over the Internet. The AWS success story has redefined the tech industry in such a way that it has radically altered the business blueprints of some of the biggest names in the history of technology, such as Microsoft, Google and Oracle. AWS blossomed into an industry-shifting technology that lets companies rent computer power and offer tools to businesses and other organiSations over the internet.

What’s in it for me?

We chalked out four learnings from Amazon’s success story:

First, Amazon’s biggest strength is its customer. The company never fails to satisfy its customer which is exactly what a millennial business or a start-up needs to focus on.

Second, do not be afraid of competitors. Amazon always displays the price of its competitor’s products. This smart move gave customers’ the choice as they could easily compare and look at Amazon as the most reasonable in the market.

Third, get the customers’ reviews. Amazon was the first venture which started customer reviews on products. The decision was criticised by the team but led to constant innovation.

Fourth, never stop experimenting. Amazon is the most prominent example of how experimenting excels start-ups in the market. So, experimentation in business must always be the primary objective and be done without the fear of being failed.

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