Amazon is in talks to buy a 9.9% stake in the retail arm of Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries. According to tweets, Amazon wants a preferred, strategic stake in Reliance Retail for JioMart.
JioMart was launched in May and poses a formidable challenge to Amazon.com’s local unit and Walmart Inc’s Flipkart. Earlier this year, Amazon India launched a program to add small local shops on its platform after India went into a lockdown to curb the spread of the coronavirus outbreak. An Amazon spokeswoman through email said the company does not comment on speculation, while Reliance did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Reliance has raised around $20 billion since late April for its digital arm, including from Alphabet Inc’s Google and Facebook Inc.
