Amazon eyes expansion, launches largest delivery station in Tamil Nadu

E-commerce major Amazon has launched a 24,000 square feet delivery station in Chennai, the largest such facility for the company in Tamil Nadu. It will help Amazon Logistics to improve its last mile delivery capabilities in the state.

"The company has doubled its delivery network in the state in the last six months with 120 own and Delivery Service Partner Stations and more than 1400 'I Have Space' partners," said Prakash Rochlani, director, Last Mile Transportation, Amazon India.

This 2x growth of the delivery network will enable Amazon to penetrate further into smaller towns across Tamil Nadu and have direct delivery presence in more than 1200 pin codes of the state with capabilities to deliver more customers within a day or two, he added.

The delivery stations enable Amazon Logistics to supplement capacity and provide flexibility to its delivery capabilities to support the growing volume of customer orders.

The expansion of delivery network includes cities and towns like Namakkal, Tiruchengodu, Sivakasi, Krishnagiri and Tiruvallur. 

Responding to the queries on whether the industry slowdown has impacted the expansion plans of the company, Rochlani said that e-commerce is only 3 per cent of the total retail industry and there is more room for growth. The expansion plans are part of long term growth, he added.

Amazon currently has six fulfillment centers in Tamil Nadu with close to 1.8 million cubic feet of storage space, three Sort Centers with more than 80000 sq ft of processing area, apart from delivery stations and 'I Have Space' stores. It has over 32,000 sellers in the state.

Across the country, it has over 50 Fulfilment Centres, storage capacity of 24 million cubic feet with presence in 13 states. It has 15 Prime Now nodes, around 200 Amazon Logistics stations, including over 50 for heavy and bulky products, 700 Service Partner nodes, close to 20,000 I Have Space stores in 350 cities and over 5 lakh sellers.