Walmart is looking to go big in the aggressively expanding Indian digital payments space. The company has — according to an RoC filing — invested close to $100 Million via Flipkart, into the company’s digital payments arm PhonePe.
The investment however, isn’t a surprise since Flipkart had committed close to $500 million in tranches, for PhonePe. However, Walmart’s follow-up on the commitment made by an ertswhile management shows that decision-making within Flipkart is in-line with the company’s previously laid out strategies.
The current investment will largely go in fueling the massive discounts that PhonePe is scheduled to offer during the IPL. This fresh capital will help it take on Paytm and the likes. Paytm has already been pretty aggressively promoting itself during India’s national cricket seasons ever since it became the official sponsor for all of the national tours across all teams, happening in India.
However, even though this capital is a welcome investments, PhonePe has been individually looking to raise investments from outside as well. The UPI-powered digital payments app has not been able to garner significant investor interest from outside of the Flipkart circle. Multiple media reports have reported talks with Tencent and others, though none of them have materialised yet.
