E-retail all set to grow the fastest, say industry experts

With 100 million Internet users, India is the third largest Internet market after China and US.

With already 100 million Internet users, 40 per cent of which do so through mobile phones, e-retail is set to grow the fastest, say industry experts.

Speaking at the annual business summit, Confluence 2011 at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A), Sachin Oswal, COO, Infibeam said, "Even if the e-commerce and especially e-retail players don't advertise, by sheer word-of-mouth, the vertical has been fastest in India. Moreover, since the country is in the middle of the technology boom, e-retail will increase tremendously in overall Internet usage in India."

Oswal was speaking during a session that focused on Entrepreneurship in E-Retail which comprised of other speakers like Kartik Taneja, MD of Verisign, Rohit Bansal, MD of Snapdeal and Kashyap Dalal, MD of Inkfruit. Talking about the technology boom, Bansal said, "Currently India is the third largest Internet market after China and the US. Soon we will overtake US in Internet usage. At such a time, more than the tangible stores that require huge investments, it is e-retail that will grow rapidly."

However, according to Taneja, it is the low bandwidth and low Internet infrastructure that are some of the challenges for e-retail. "Moreover, over 95 per cent of Indians prefer to communicate in their own language. Hence, there is a language barrier for Internet market as well," he added.

While the second session focused on e-retail, the earlier session was on public policy and social change comprising speakers like Bhavarlal Hiralal Jain the founder and Chairman of Jain Irrigation, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, noted journalist and educator and Satish Jha, current President and CEO of One Laptop per Child India Foundation.

"There are certain challenges in implementing drip irrigation, and educating farmers about the benefits of this superior mode of irrigation. While our company was not in the Fortune 500, it was among the Fortunate 50 companies, fortunate enough to be able to contribute to social change.

Meanwhile, Jha said that there was an urgency with respect to educating a child – the time a child loses in getting educated does not come back and hence, it is necessary to reach out to each and every child as soon as possible. He also spoke about the important of thinking in leaps as opposed to small increments in order to truly make a change.