Amazon has announced that it will shut down its food delivery business in India in 2020. Called Amazon Food, and the service was said to be shutting down from December 29. It was noted that during the transition process, it will do its best to ensure that both the consumers who use this service and their partners are not affected.
The company said it had raised between $18 billion and $20 billion in India last year. But it still lagged behind its rival and Flipkart, which was bought by Walmart for $16 billion, so it didn’t get the expected return.
Amazon launched its food delivery operations in certain parts of India in May 2020. With this move, the e-commerce giant planned to compete with big players such as Zomato and Swiggy. The company, which has invested more than $6.5 billion in India, has launched its food delivery service called Amazon Food in certain parts of Bengaluru. The company originally planned to launch services in India last year, but those plans were later delayed to March. However, the service could not be launched on the expected date due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Company’s investment plans in India In January 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos announced that Amazon would invest $1 billion in small businesses located in India. Making a statement at a conference held in New Delhi, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos shared that Amazon will invest a total of $1 billion in small businesses in India. But this was an investment made at a time when the Covid-19 pandemic had not yet begun.
Amazon came to the fore last month with the news that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy launched a major internal review to cut costs. One of the leading roles in the review was Alexa, which is the most important part of Amazon’s hardware and smart home strategy. Amazon’s hardware unit has suffered over $5 billion in losses in recent years.
Wanting to reduce the damage in question, Amazon has put Alexa, one of Amazon’s most popular products, under scrutiny. The main subject of the review is the development process of Alexa. In short, Amazon, along with the review, is trying to understand whether the investment in Alexa will make sense. If a negative decision is made as a result of the review, Amazon’s development-oriented investments in Alexa may decrease.
