The holiday season means a boost in orders for online e-commerce giants like Amazon, a firm that’s doing its best to maintain its Prime pledge of delivery within two or three days.
It’s difficult to imagine that the company has ambitions to trim its delivery time, at least in some locations, by an astonishing amount.
Just how tight will the turn be? Bloomberg has reported that Amazon is testing 15 minute deliveries in Bangalore, India.
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The news outlet describes this region as a tech hub and says Amazon seems determined to compete with other outlets in India’s “fledgling” quick-commerce business.
Amit Agarwal, Amazon’s senior vice president for emerging markets, described the initiative to Bloomberg News as a “pilot” and said it will roll out soon. The product catalog available will be specific to each neighborhood, but would likely include items like groceries and household goods.
Data will drive this, and Agarwal says that they can drill down to behavioral trends that are region-specific. He gave the example where a neighborhood with a lot of readers would be offered a quick commerce inventory that included more books.
Bloomberg has characterized this region as a burgeoning middle class one, where quick commerce already has gained a foothold. Some grocers claim to be able to deliver goods within ten minutes in the area.
According to Bloomberg, “India is one of the fastest growing markets for Amazon’s e-commerce, cloud and video streaming businesses outside of its home region of the US.”
And while this area of the world will serve as a test bed, it’s possible that – if effective – quick commerce capabilities could spread. Amazon says this experimental initiative could be a potential precursor to a broader rollout.
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