Flipkart’s ‘Big 10’ sale begins next week, eyes 5-fold growth in transactions

New Delhi: E-commerce major Flipkart expects to see a five-fold growth in transactions on its platform during its ‘Big 10’ sale that begins next week.[caption id="attachment_3377424" align="alignleft" width="380"] Reuters[/caption]The Big 10 sale, which is different from the flagship The Big Billion Days sale, will be held between 14 and 18 May to mark completion of 10 years of Flipkart’s operations.“We have been preparing for months for this sale. It is a big event for us. During the sale, we expect about 5X of the usual number of transactions we see on our platform on any given day,” Flipkart director Smrithi Ravichandran told PTI.She added that the company has also expanded its back-end operations for logistics and last-mile delivery to ensure smooth operations during the sale days. Flipkart doesn’t disclose number of transactions on its platform.The sale will see Flipkart offering deals on products across categories like fashion, smartphones, electronics, smart televisions and home decor.“We have expanded warehousing capacity. We have also added mom and pop stores as partners to ensure smooth last mile delivery,” she said.Interestingly, Flipkart’s sale comes just after US-based rival Amazon’s sale, something Ravichandran said was just coincidence.Amazon has commenced sale from today which will last till 14 May. Both companies are aggressively investing into the Indian market, expanding their infrastructure and platform to bring more sellers and shoppers on board.In April, Flipkart received a funding of $1.4 billion from eBay, Microsoft, and Tencent, while Amazon has also pledged investments worth $5 billion into the Indian market.According to a Google-AT Kearney report, the number of online shoppers in India is estimated to grow 3.5 times to touch 175 million by 2020, from 50 million in 2015. Also, e-tailing is expected to drive 25 percent of the total organised retail sales of $240 billion in India by 2020, as per the report.