The Indian arm of American e-commerce major Amazon has launched Amazon Business, a marketplace catering to the procurement needs of small and medium businesses such as technology and service companies, manufacturers, universities, schools and offices.
Business sellers registered with Amazon will provide SMBs access to over 10 crore products, including network storage solutions, electronics, office supplies, etc., with GST compliant invoices. SMBs can also benefit from technology-led solutions, attractive pricing, and a convenient shopping experience, Amazon said in a statement.
“With this launch, we now have a fully functional B2B marketplace alongside our thriving B2C marketplace to enable the same benefits for business buyers including a vast selection, value, convenience of doorstep delivery, and more,†Manish Tiwary, vice president category management at Amazon India, said in the statement.
Amazon claims to already have more than 15,000 business sellers enrolled on Amazon Business, who offer products with GST invoices. Businesses can register with Amazon Business with their GST number and thus become entitled to input tax credit (varying between 5% and 28% basis different product types).
Besides this, Amazon Business also offers features like business-only pricing and quantity discount on bulk orders.
Amazon Business was first launched in the US in April 2015 and now serves more than one million enterprise customers. It is available across five countries globally.
The Amazon.in marketplace is operated by Amazon Seller Services Private Ltd, an affiliate of Amazon.com. In July this year, VCCircle reported that Amazon.com Inc. has infused $260 million (Rs 1,680 crore) in Amazon Seller Services Pvt. Ltd.
In November 2016, Amazon Seller had raised Rs 2,010 crore. According to estimates, the fresh tranche of funding takes the company’s total investments in Amazon Seller to $2 billion.
Amazon, which had committed $5 billion into for its India operations, has always been bullish on the country. Earlier this month, it had bought a 5% stake in local brick-and-mortar retail chain Shoppers Stop Ltd to expand its physical shopping points.