Flipkart raises $700 million in fresh funding

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Flipkart, India's largest online retailer, on Saturday said it had raised funding worth $700 million, as it tries to compete with Amazon, which is rapidly scaling up operations in the country.

Flipkart, founded in 2007 by two former Amazon employees, has been in talks in recent weeks to raise up to $1 billion.

The company said it raised the $700 million from new investors including Baillie Gifford, Greenoaks Capital, Steadview Capital, T. Rowe Price Associates and Qatar Investment Authority along with existing investors including DST Global, GIC, ICONIQ Capital and Tiger Global.

Popular for selling books and electronics online, Flipkart operates as a marketplace that allows third-party vendors to sell products on the site.

This year it acquired fashion portal Myntra and crossed the $1 billion mark in gross merchandise value.

The company is incorporated in Singapore and has filed with the regulator there for conversion to a public company, obligatory for companies with more than 50 shareholders, it said in the statement.

"This filing ensures we are in compliance with the laws of Singapore and is in no way indicative of any upcoming IPO or of any corporate activity that the company is engaged in either in Singapore or any other part of the world," the statement added.

(Reporting by Swati Bhat, editing by William Hardy)