Amazon pumps in Rs 1,700 crore into Indian arm

New Delhi: E-commerce giant Amazon has pumped in over Rs 1,700 crore into its payments and wholesale business units in India, as per regulatory documents.

Amazon Pay India has received Rs 1,355 crore from Amazon Corporate Holdings Pvt Ltd and Amazon.com.incs. Limited, regulatory documents filed with the corporate affairs ministry showed.

The digital payment unit allotted shares to the said units on December 31, 2019, the documents sourced by business intelligence platform Tofler, said.

Amazon Wholesale (India) Pvt Ltd allotted shares worth about Rs 360 crore on December 30 to Amazon Corporate Holdings Pvt Ltd and Amazon.com.incs.

Limited, a separate filing showed. Emails sent to Amazon India on the fund infusion did not elicit a response.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is scheduled to visit India this week, meeting top government functionaries, business leaders and SMBs. Thousands of small-scale traders' union under Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) are planning to hold protests around the country during Bezos' stay in India.

Also, India's antitrust body Competition Commission of India on Monday ordered an investigation into alleged violations of competition laws by Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart.

Amazon and rival Flipkart have been pumping in millions of dollars across various operations like marketplace, infrastructure and supply chain management as well as marketing and promotion as they look to strengthen their position in the fledgling Indian e-commerce market.

In October last year, Amazon had infused over Rs 4,400 crore (more than $600 million) in its various units in India including marketplace and food retail.

Amazon, which is locked in a bruising battle against Flipkart, had registered cumulative losses of over Rs 7,000 crore across various units in 2018-19. The continued flow of fresh investments, however, is indicative of Amazon's confidence in the Indian market.

"In the last 24 months, Amazon has poured in more than half a billion dollars into its Indian payment business alone.

That's stunning and an indication of how competitive, the payment space has become in India," Vivek Durai, founder, paper.vc, a business signals platform.