Amazon pumps in money into MORE to take on the heavyweights Reliance Retail and DMart

• Amazon and Samara Capital are investing ₹275 crore ($37.5 million) into MORE, according to filings sourced by paper.vc.
• Samara and Amazon had together invested ₹4,050 crore ($450 million) in MORE in 2018.
• The investment into MORE comes at a time when the grocery e-retail space is heating up in India.

Before the Mukesh Ambani and Kishore Biyani’s deal was announced, several reports did the rounds that global e-commerce giant Amazon was going to get a cut in the deal. While Reliance Retail and Future Group have gone ahead with the deal, Amazon has moved back to betting more on an investment from over one and a half years ago.

Amazon and Samara Capital are investing ₹275 crore ($37.5 million) into MORE – the retail chain the duo had acquired from Kumar Mangalam Birla’s Aditya Birla Group, according to filings sourced by financial data platform paper.vc. “This is the first time they have infused money into the supermarket chain after acquiring it 18 months ago,” said Jayraj Patel from paper.vc.

Samara and Amazon had together invested ₹4,050 crore ($450 million) in MORE in 2018. Samara Capital holds a 51% stake in the retail chain, while Amazon owns 49%. This was one of the first offline retail bets for the global e-commerce giant in India. It had soon followed up with a partnership with Kishore Biyani’s Future Retail.

Retail chain	No. of stores
DMart	214
Reliance Retail	11,784
Future Retail	1500
MORE	620+

While MORE may have more store counts than Radhakishan Damani led DMart, it falls behind Reliance, Future and DMart in terms of sales.

The investment into MORE comes at a time when the grocery e-retail space is heating up in India. MORE stores are used by Amazon Prime for its hyperlocal grocery delivery. The space will see tough competition from Reliance’s JioMart which is also betting on the offline-online space by partnering with kirana stores across the country.

During Jeff Bezos’ visit to India in February 2020, the Amazon top boss had said the company will be investing $1 billion into India.


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