
Flipkart Raises $160M From Dragoneer Investment, Morgan Stanley Investment - dotmanish
http://www.medianama.com/2013/10/223-flipkart-160m-investment/
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arihant
There are two points people miss in discussions around FLipkart:

1.) Flipkart in India is about access, not just convenience. Even with large
bookstores like Landmark, Crossword, etc. all over the city, not every book s
available all the time. Say I want to buy a Swiss army knife from a small city
- Flipkart is where I go!

2.) The ₹500 minimum order requirement is a bit of a pain. But Flipkart
usually still works out cheaper. Firstly, not many things apart from books
would be available for less than 500. And books on Flipkart are massively
discounted. I bought a book last week for ₹450, with a markup of ₹795. I
gladly paid the shipping and got it next day morning!

Anybody who is complaining about Flipkart should really try it. One day free
shipping halfway across the country is just crazy! No other e-com site does
that. Amazon doesn't provide that fast shipping for free either! And most
other e-com sites in the country are only about Fashion and Clothing, while
Amazon India is just a better looking ebay.

~~~
enscr
Flipkart is awesome but you can't say that they are incomparable. Innovation
in e-commerce in India is happening in logistics. And everyone is vying for
shipping as fast as possible and delivering on Sundays too.

Ultimately, Indian consumer is winning !

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kamaal
Flipkart was once the go to site for any online shopping. But I guess the
Indian e-commerce ecosystem has come a long way from there. Today you have a
dozen operators in this scene. Its actually nothing new in India, once you are
successful a lot of try to replicate it albeit they do it better.

Either way, the biggest benefits that used to exist with Flipkart are gone.
They no longer ship free for purchases less than 500 rupees, so spending an
extra 50 when you can drive down to the nearest bookstore makes no sense. They
have also become famous when it comes to cancelling orders the very next day
you ordered, if the price of the goods you ordered went up.

In fact I guess Flipkart is now large transforming itself into an ebay kind of
site, I guess that's the way they will eventually go.

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jeswin
Which are the sites that you think do it better? I have used a bunch of other
websites, but IMO from aesthetics to tracking Flipkart is way better. However,
there are things I find cheaper on SnapDeal.

Free shipping for less than Rs 500 is an unreasonable expectation. It will
cost more than 50 bucks (and a lot of time) to drive down given petrol prices.
Finally, the nearest book store may not be stocking what you need.

Eventually, Flipkart will become an Amazon. They seem to be following the
exact same path.

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Alterlife
Flipkart doesn't have Amazon's reputation for customer service... and shows no
interest in improving it either.

I've been stung twice by inaccurate specs on their website before I decided to
keep away permanently: 1\. A phone which I kept. 2\. An LCD which I returned.

... And they always err on the the side which makes the product look better.

They do not fix the descriptions of when complained about, and they delete
reviews which point inaccuracies in the product description.

They're a terrible brand, and I hope they fail.

\-- edit:

A couple of examples:

1\. [http://www.flipkart.com/dell-
inspiron-14z-5423-ultrabook-2nd...](http://www.flipkart.com/dell-
inspiron-14z-5423-ultrabook-2nd-gen-ci3-2gb-500gb-win8-1gb-
graph/p/itmdn28bxkkttjrm?pid=COMDN283XYK8ZZ3J&otracker=from-
search&srno=t_1&query=ultrabook&ref=466f6302-405d-46ec-b203-e6ba37dd0cb0)

Dell Inspiration 14z "Ultrabook"... No SSD or msata.

2\.
[http://www.flipkart.com/laptops/pr?p%5B%5D=facets.processor%...](http://www.flipkart.com/laptops/pr?p%5B%5D=facets.processor%255B%255D%3DCore%2Bi5%2B%25282nd%2BGeneration%2529&p%5B%5D=sort%3Drelevance&sid=6bo%2Cb5g&q=intel+hd+graphics+4000#jumpTo=0|4)

Apple laptops are better than the others: 2nd generation Intel processor, but
they have Intel HD Graphics 4000.

Don't get me wrong. A few typos are fine.

The problem is that with Flipkart this is normal and they don't clean it up.

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aniketpant
Flipkart definitely took the Indian market by storm. They offered Free
Shipping for orders even less than INR 200, and that too with Cash on
Delivery. That was rad. But, it was very much expected to go soon because a
company can't sustain that way.

Personally, I feel that the Indian customers expect a lot of free stuff which
is sort of ridiculous. I mean you have a number of book stores, showrooms
selling clothes, computers and loads of other things just next to your house,
yet you wait for an order which might arrive after a week. It makes sense if
you want to buy a coffee maker because that will come with free shipping and a
reduced price, but please don't expect the same for small items.

What interests me more is the fact that Flipkart is already close to Amazon's
marketplace at the moment and I am sure that it will continue to grow in that
direction. What if Amazon acquires Flipkart at some point of time?

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kamaal
>>Personally, I feel that the Indian customers expect a lot of free stuff
which is sort of ridiculous.

The fact is that we are upto cultural problems here.

>>but please don't expect the same for small items.

Again, which part of India do you live? Have you seen how vegetable push cart
vendors, street salesmen or hawkers are treated. These people not just deliver
a very low price stuff for free, but go further and have to face bargains for
as little as 1 - 2 rupees.

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jezclaremurugan
Flipkart is one of the main reasons online shopping has become prevalent in
India, but after becoming a marketplace they have messed up a bit (experiences
of some friends and [http://www.thinkdigit.com/Internet/Flipkart-screwed-me-
over-...](http://www.thinkdigit.com/Internet/Flipkart-screwed-me-over-Heres-
how-they_17224.html) for example). If they manage to get the trust back, they
have a great future, if not they will soon be unable to differentiate
themselves from the other sites that are so rapidly cropping up.

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kartikkumar
I wonder how they are going to tackle supply chain issues. I think if they can
crack supply and distribution in a way that ensures that the mindset shifts
from "I can just go down the street and pick it up directly" to "this is so
damn convenient". With rising fuel costs, and with it, rising costs of living,
I think a company like Flipkart has the ability to stabilize markets. Will be
interesting to see where this heads, particularly with all the investors they
have on-board.

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hrjet
The biggest difference between Flipkart of today and that of yesteryear is
that Flipkart is now a marketplace. This is unwieldy. There are 5 different
sellers for the same goods with different prices, different offers, and
different shipping rates. Moreover, the free shipping offer can't be used when
you are purchasing from multiple vendors.

The other sad news was the closure of their digital music store. Flipkart
please take my money and give me back the music!

~~~
Nickste
I find that Flipkart does a pretty good job of managing your expectations in
terms of delivery, even though you're buying from a 3rd party supplier. They
update you when the seller accepts the order, packs it, when it is collected
from the seller and finally through the entire delivery process.

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ateevchopra
What Flipkart has done in so much less time is amazing. Their Logistics are
much much better. My college is in a remote area of Chennai. SO there aren't
much shops nearby. So the entire population of my college depends on flipkart
for its daily needs. This has solved a very big problem for us. And I'm sure
there are lot more colleges in India who are connected to the supermarkets via
flipkart.

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fedvasu
Am I the only guy rooting for Snapdeal? I mean yeah, currently flipkart is
better than snapdeal, but snapdeal has better pricing and variety in
products,Snapdeal needs good engineering talent now,specially with their
search and filtering of products.

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linux_devil
$500M of total funding is mammoth . I wonder whats going on . Since guruji
couldn't become Google of India(Google of India is Google). I can't see
Flipkart to be Amazon of India

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uhsnamih
I wonder why the investors chose to forego combined annual interest of over
25M (~ 541*0.05), for a non profit.

~~~
thewarrior
Good question. Maybe they know something we don't ?

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mydarshankumar
Rahul Gandhi's 'Jupiter Escape Velocity' seems like a good metaphor for
Flipkart's fund-raising prowess.

