According to reports, Walmart-owned e-commerce company Flipkart may launch a quick commerce service in the coming months to compete with the likes of Zepto, Swiggy’s Instamart and Zomato’s Blinkit.
“Flipkart is developing this service and may launch it in the next few months. The company has also set up several dark stores in the country to provide this quick service.” Business Standard reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The move comes at a time when 15-20 minute delivery services offered by Zepto, Instamart and Blinkit are stealing a majority of product sales from Flipkart and Amazon.
Responding to the report, Flipkart said: “At Flipkart, customer centricity is at the core of everything we do. We are constantly working towards delivering a wide range of products to our customers quickly. Over the past few months, we have made multiple investments to enhance Our delivery capabilities include adding same-day delivery in 20 cities. These include mobile phones, essentials, electronics, home appliances, fashion, books and lifestyle products. We are committed to meeting changing customer expectations and delivering on value, Delivering excellent service in terms of choice and speed, more initiatives in this area are expected to be rolled out in the coming months.”
Previously, Flipkart launched same-day delivery of products across multiple categories in 20 cities, including Bhubaneswar, Coimbatore, Guwahati, Indore, Jaipur, Ludhiana, Nagar Metropolitan and non-metropolitan areas such as Pur, Patna, Raipur, Siliguri and Vijayawada.
The company may cover more cities in the coming months, the report said, adding, “The Express Commerce program is different from this service as it aims to deliver products faster.”