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e-com v.2

Old: B2C. Gold: B2B

Inventory-led B2C e-commerce is passe. Instead, young, VC-backed B2B startups like Meesho and Udaan are heralding a new dawn in Indian e-commerce

20/12/18

Salman SH

The Amazon-Flipkart war is history, and with it, so is B2C inventory-led e-commerce

B2B is the new black. Startups like Udaan and Meesho have raised millions of dollars from the likes of DST Global and Sequoia

Students, homemakers and working professionals are selling on their platforms, using social media to reach end customers

Do these startups herald a new wave of Indian e-commerce?  

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For many years now, the predominant model for e-commerce in India was “inventory-led”— customers order a product which ships instantly from warehouses run by online marketplaces like Flipkart or Amazon. In days gone by, the inventory belonged to Flipkart and Amazon, but later on, after pressure from India’s government, the inventory could belong to any of the third-party sellers that sell through these platforms.

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