One deal at a time: How Mukesh Ambani is trying to take on Amazon in India

Asia's richest man is sharpening his focus on e-commerce with a string of tiny acquisitions and stake purchases to face Amazon.

A $2.5 billion spending spree involving more than two dozen deals provides some insight into how Mukesh Ambani is piecing together a strategy to take on Amazon.com Inc. in India.

Asia’s richest man is sharpening his focus on e-commerce with a string of tiny acquisitions and stake purchases to face the world’s largest online retailer, after shaking up India’s telecommunications industry with cheap data and free calls.

The acquisitions represent a new strategy for Ambani’s Reliance Group, whose founder -- his father Dhirubhai Ambani -- built a petrochemicals business and the world’s largest oil-refining complex from scratch. It’s a clear pivot toward consumer offerings in a country that’s becoming a battleground for giants such as Amazon.com and Walmart Inc.’s Flipkart Online Services Pvt.

“The deals may be tiny, but it’s more likely that they are putting together a team of talented people by acquisitions, who can then be invested in to build out larger platform products,” said Kunal Agrawal, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence.

Ambani is racing to grab a share of an online shopping market that Morgan Stanley estimates will grow to be valued at $200 billion by 2028 from about $30 billion last year. India will have 829 million smartphone users by 2022, according to Cisco Systems Inc., from a projected half a billion this year. That means a potential surge in demand for online services and products from music to food delivery, electronic gadgets and clothes.

‘Shopping Experience’

Ambani outlined his plan to shareholders in July, saying the effort will involve the group’s unlisted businesses Reliance Retail Ltd. and Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. He has already spent about $36 billion on Jio, which has rolled out a nationwide 4G network and fibre broadband infrastructure, causing some established rivals to pull back.

The platform will use augmented reality, holographs and virtual reality to create an “immersive shopping experience,” said Ambani, 61. Reliance’s consumer businesses will contribute nearly as much to the conglomerate’s overall earnings as its bread-and-butter energy businesses by the end of 2028, he said.

The service will seek to get on board the millions of mom-and-pop stores that dominate the Indian retail market, providing heft to its operations. Chains and large department stores account for only 10 per cent of the market.

Business Standard