The food and beverage section of the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) might soon be penetrated by Walmart-owned e-commerce company Flipkart, as per a report by the Economic Times.
Users will soon be given the option to order from a wide range of restaurants via the Flipkart app. ONDC and Flipkart are reportedly in close talks for the deal.
Interestingly, in 2022, ONDC was launched by the government as an alternative to e-commerce giants such as Amazon and Flipkart. The main intent behind the launch of ONDC was to give more space to small merchants and to curb the monopoly of big players.
In April this year, the government asked both Amazon and Flipkart to set up ONDC forefronts on their respective home pages, as per the Economic Times. The main purpose behind this was to improve order efficiency and operations.
The first starting point for Flipkart in ONDC will reportedly be F&B. It will be followed by the logistics arm of Flipkart, Ekart. While Ekart was in advanced talks with ONDC for integration, however, there hasn’t been any advance so far, as per the report.
Flipkart will operate on the customer-facing side or the buyer side of the government-backed ONDC platform. With regards to the tie-up, Flipkart executives reportedly met ONDC officials.
The new service would streamline the company's F&B ordering business by eliminating the need for a dedicated fleet of food delivery personnel or persuading restaurants to partner directly with Flipkart. Further, ONDC's sellers in the food and beverage category will be visible to the e-commerce platform’s users.
Recently, ONDC was also in the news for recording 89 lakh transactions in the month of May. As per a statement by the company, “Categories like grocery, fashion, home, and kitchen have seen rising shares, indicating diversification of ONDC’s retail business. With the increase in contribution by other categories, the food segment accounted for around 20 per cent of total retail orders in May, compared to 76 per cent a year ago, when food was the only category.”
