Flipkart to replace 40% of its delivery vans with EVs

Flipkart is currently focused on driving the growth of e-commerce in India to get 200-300 million new customers into e-commerce fold," a Flipkart spokesperson

Walmart Inc's Indian unit Flipkart said late Thursday it plans to replace nearly 40% of its current fleet of delivery vans with electric vehicles (EVs) by March 2020, as part of its efforts to cut down on its carbon footprint.

The Bengaluru-based ecommerce company said it will start with deploying 160 vans by 2019-end. Some of these EVs are already plying in the country's capital of New Delhi.

Flipkart has amped up its focus on sustainability since its $16 billion acquisition by Walmart last year. The company has also expanded its operations at a fast pace as it competes with rival Amazon Inc in India's online sales market.

Flipkart's move towards electric vehicles, the first among big online firms in the country, comes as the Indian government is pushing for faster adoption of these to fight pollution.

"These efforts will help us meaningfully contribute towards electric mobility... while bringing cost efficiencies for the business. In this process, we also hope to create an ecosystem for adoption of electric mobility in India," Amitesh Jha, senior vice-president of Ekart and Marketplace at Flipkart, said in a statement.

Ecommerce companies in India are also in talks with the government around various policies related to their operations in the country. Earlier this week, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal met with ecommerce companies, including Flipkart, to talk about compliance with new foreign investment rules, Reuters reported citing sources.

In a statement dated June 27, Flipkart said it is working with local partners to co-design concepts for EVs best suited for the growing e-commerce industry.

"We believe these small but meaningful steps in this direction will go a long way in paving the way for larger adoption of EVs in the country," group Chief Executive Kalyan Krishnamurthy, said. The electric last-mile delivery vehicles will help cut Flipkart's carbon emissions by over 50%, the company added.

China's Alibaba aims to double Tmall Global brands with English portal

SHANGHAI - Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba on Wednesday launched an English-language website for its TmallGlobal marketplace aimed at merchants, in an attempt to double the number of international brands on the platform to 40,000 in the next three years. 

The company said in a statement it wants to make Tmall Global, which currently hosts 20,000 international brands across 77 countries and regions, more appealing and accessible to niche, small- and medium-sized brands from other countries. 

The new portal comes as Alibaba is facing lean e-commerce revenue growth, which has been further threatened by the ongoing U.S.-China trade spat, and increased competition from rivals such as recently listed Pinduoduo Inc 

"We believe the launch of this English-language website will expedite the process for brands and merchants to introduce their products to Chinese consumers," said Yi Qian, deputy general manager, Tmall Global.

Initially, interested brands were able to get in touch with Alibaba mainly through trade shows, personal introductions, or its Chinese-language website, the company said. 

The new English-language portal, which will assist merchants with tasks such as opening shops on Tmall Global, will eventually be available in other languages such as Spanish and Japanese, the e-commerce giant added.

Amazon launches new in-store pickup option with Rite Aid as first partner

How online shopping is boxing in people

NEW DELHI: As online shopping becomes ubiquitous, so do the boxes delivered to homes across the country.

For apartment dwellers — and the managers of the buildings they live in — it’s tough to manage the boxes that pile up, sometimes clogging precious space for days.

The problem’s only getting worse, says Rick Haugheyof National Multifamily HousingCouncil, which represents many owners, developers and managers of apartment housing. People are ordering more heavy, oversize and perishable items than ever before, he notes, and building managers are “tasked with finding new and creative ways to meet the demand for package storage, sorting and security.”

There are a growing number of technologies and services aimed at alleviating the delivery problem in apartment foyers. UPS, FedEx and Amazon all have begun offering services to help manage the flow of delivery boxes. The Amazon Hub programme, for example, includes Amazon Locker, based at third-party locations like Whole Foods; Locker+, with staffed locations for pickups and dropoffs; and Apartment Locker accepts packages in apartment buildings, among other services.

“It’s a huge issue for a lot of apartment buildings. There’s a security factor, but also a convenience factor. Building management offices aren’t open as late as some residents need them to be in order to retrieve packages, and just accepting a building’s packages can easily become a fulltime job,” says Melody Akhtari, spokeswoman for Luxer One, which started out in 2005 with lockers in apartment buildings for dry cleaning.

There are services that arrange deliveries for a specific time when residents know they’ll be home; or let recipients have packages delivered to secure hubs or other locations that are conveniently located and open late. There’s also Fetch which collects packages, stores them offsite and delivers them when the recipient is home, taking the burden off building managers.

And the challenge doesn’t end at delivery and storage. Once the boxes are opened, some are shipped back as returns, while others create a trash or recycling headache.

Flipkart to replace 40% of its delivery vans with EVs

Flipkart is currently focused on driving the growth of e-commerce in India to get 200-300 million new customers into e-commerce fold," a Flipkart spokesperson

Walmart Inc's Indian unit Flipkart said late Thursday it plans to replace nearly 40% of its current fleet of delivery vans with electric vehicles (EVs) by March 2020, as part of its efforts to cut down on its carbon footprint.

The Bengaluru-based ecommerce company said it will start with deploying 160 vans by 2019-end. Some of these EVs are already plying in the country's capital of New Delhi.

Flipkart has amped up its focus on sustainability since its $16 billion acquisition by Walmart last year. The company has also expanded its operations at a fast pace as it competes with rival Amazon Inc in India's online sales market.

Flipkart's move towards electric vehicles, the first among big online firms in the country, comes as the Indian government is pushing for faster adoption of these to fight pollution.

"These efforts will help us meaningfully contribute towards electric mobility... while bringing cost efficiencies for the business. In this process, we also hope to create an ecosystem for adoption of electric mobility in India," Amitesh Jha, senior vice-president of Ekart and Marketplace at Flipkart, said in a statement.

Ecommerce companies in India are also in talks with the government around various policies related to their operations in the country. Earlier this week, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal met with ecommerce companies, including Flipkart, to talk about compliance with new foreign investment rules, Reuters reported citing sources.

In a statement dated June 27, Flipkart said it is working with local partners to co-design concepts for EVs best suited for the growing e-commerce industry.

"We believe these small but meaningful steps in this direction will go a long way in paving the way for larger adoption of EVs in the country," group Chief Executive Kalyan Krishnamurthy, said. The electric last-mile delivery vehicles will help cut Flipkart's carbon emissions by over 50%, the company added.

China's Alibaba aims to double Tmall Global brands with English portal

SHANGHAI - Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba on Wednesday launched an English-language website for its TmallGlobal marketplace aimed at merchants, in an attempt to double the number of international brands on the platform to 40,000 in the next three years. 

The company said in a statement it wants to make Tmall Global, which currently hosts 20,000 international brands across 77 countries and regions, more appealing and accessible to niche, small- and medium-sized brands from other countries. 

The new portal comes as Alibaba is facing lean e-commerce revenue growth, which has been further threatened by the ongoing U.S.-China trade spat, and increased competition from rivals such as recently listed Pinduoduo Inc 

"We believe the launch of this English-language website will expedite the process for brands and merchants to introduce their products to Chinese consumers," said Yi Qian, deputy general manager, Tmall Global.

Initially, interested brands were able to get in touch with Alibaba mainly through trade shows, personal introductions, or its Chinese-language website, the company said. 

The new English-language portal, which will assist merchants with tasks such as opening shops on Tmall Global, will eventually be available in other languages such as Spanish and Japanese, the e-commerce giant added.

Amazon launches new in-store pickup option with Rite Aid as first partner

By Stephen Nellis

Amazon.com has steadily added options for customers to receive their packages including in car trunks, inside home garages and potentially by drone.

On Thursday, Amazon added another alternative for U.S. customers: Walk into a nearby retailer and pick up an Amazon package over the counter.

The new option, called Counter, will launch with pharmacy Rite Aid Corp offering the service in 100 stores, with an expansion to 1,500 stores by year's end, the companies said. Amazon is also looking to get other retailers, including small businesses, to join the program as it expands.

The new option builds on Amazon's previous efforts to put lockers inside retail stores where customers can pick up packages. Patrick Supanc, world director of Amazon Hub, told Reuters the locker has spread to thousands of stores but some retailers do not have the space to accommodate a locker.

"Overall, we want to give every Amazon customer the option of an alternative delivery location," Supanc said. "This will become an extensive network."

Amazon said the service will not cost extra and will work with existing shipping options such as same-day service. When a package arrives at a store, the customer will get an email notification. Once in the store, the customer shows an employee a barcode, and the employee scans it, finds the package and hands it over. The service was originally launched in the United Kingdom and Italy with retailers NEXT, Giunti Al Punto Librerie, Fermopoint and SisalPay. Amazon's Supanc would not comment on the financial details of the deals or whether Amazon is paying the retailers to participate.

Supanc said early data from the European launch has shown "very clear evidence" that the increased foot traffic from Amazon customers coming into partner stores increases sales there.

"They're being introduced to Amazon customers, and Amazon customers are getting to know that store. That additional footfall into their stores translates into additional sales for those partners," he said.

In a statement, Jocelyn Konrad, executive vide president of pharmacy and retail operations at Rite Aid, said the program, along with Amazon's lockers in Rite Aid stores, "creates a stronger in-store experience for existing customers and new customers that come in to pick up their packages."

Supanc said that the two companies were "not sharing any retail data with each other" and that the effort was focused on delivery experiences and not connected to Amazon's other efforts to get into pharmacy retailing, such as its purchase of startup.

Flipkart to roll out reward system SuperCoins from July

Flipkart is currently focused on driving the growth of e-commerce in India to get 200-300 million new customers into e-commerce fold," a Flipkart spokesperson

New Delhi: E-commerce firm Flipkart Wednesday said it will roll out multi-brand rewards ecosystem 'SuperCoins' using which its customers can shop on various online platforms such as Zomato, OYO and Makemytrip. "SuperCoins can be earned on all Flipkart transactions and partner services hosted on the Flipkart App and can be redeemed for exciting rewards from an ever-increasing rewards portfolio, making every single transaction a rewarding experience for customers," Flipkart said in a statement. 

SuperCoins will work for not only shopping on Flipkart, but also across more than 100 partner brands including Zomato, OYO, UrbanClap, PhonePe and MakeMyTrip, it added. 

"With SuperCoins, customers will now be rewarded for doing everything they love, agnostic of which brand services they avail, and it will all be managed on one single platform," Flipkart Vice-President (Growth and Monetisation) Prakash Sikaria said. 

Flipkart Plus members will get double SuperCoins than non-Plus members. 

"The SuperCoins ecosystem is open to customers irrespective of the payment method they choose," the statement said.