Back in 2016 US retail giant, Walmart was in talks to invest up to whopping $1 billion Flipkart. Nothing ever happened on that, however, now according to new report from Reuters, Walmart is said to be in talks to acquire more than 40% of Flipkart.
Walmart is said to be in talks to buy existing and new shares of Flipkart and due diligence is likely to begin as early as next week, the sources said. The terms and proposals are under wraps at the moment. Flipkart would be valued at more than the $12 billion figure given that Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp’s Vision Fund took roughly a fifth of the firm last year for $2.5 billion.
Neither Flipkart nor Walmart commented on the ongoing speculation just as expected. However, With Walmart acquisition, Flipkart would get a good boost in its fight against Amazon which is said to expand in India with an investment close to $5 billion that would also include online grocery delivery. Despite so many attempts to enter India, Walmart restricted itself to cash-and-carry’ wholesale business amid tough restrictions on foreign investment. The company currently operates 21 such stores in India.
Flipkart’s current investors include U.S. hedge fund Tiger Global Management, China’s Tencent Holdings Ltd, online marketplace eBay Inc and software giant Microsoft Corp.
Sources familiar with the matter, to Reuters said:
As large as they are, Amazon has eaten away a significant chunk of their revenues and I think… they view India as the largest market possibly for this (taking on Amazon).