Flipkart to roll out free video streaming service

New Delhi: Upping its ante against rival Amazon, Walmart-backed Flipkart on Monday said it will roll out video streaming service and make its platform available in vernacular languages as part of its efforts to woo the next 200 million internet users onto its platform.

The video streaming service 'Flipkart Videos' will be ad-supported and available free for users on Flipkart's app.

The content available will be a mix of short films, full-length movies and episodic series, and the company is in discussions with content makers to expand the library.

The move also assumes significance in view of the upcoming festive season that accounts for a significant share of India's e-commerce sector's annual sales volumes.

"We have a lot of investment going into this. Apart from shopping, we also want users to spend time on the platform and engage.

We will use content as an engagement opportunity. We will continue being an e-commerce platform," Flipkart CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy said.