Alibaba eyeing Indian market
Alibaba is looking to enter the Indian e-commerce market this year. In an article published by The Times of India on Friday (18 March) – and posted on Alibaba’s Alizila online newsboard – Alibaba Group president J Michael Evans was quoted as saying: “We are planning to enter the e-commerce business in India in 2016. We have been exploring very carefully the e-commerce opportunity in this country, which we think is very exciting on the backdrop of Digital India.”
Evans and Alibaba Group’s global managing director K Guru Gowrappan met with India’s telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Friday.
“We have investments in both payments and e-commerce already and we will over the course of [the] next year will figure about exactly what our strategy is,” Evans added.
Alibaba has made investments in Paytm and Snapdeal.
Other sources have suggested that Alibaba may look to set up a joint venture with a major Indian firm – and the Tata Group has been mentioned as a possible partner.
