Amazon, the online e-commerce major, has made a delayed offer for FreeCharge. FreeCharge is the digital transactions platform possessed by Snapdeal, the concerned e-commerce marketplace. This offer from Amazon comes at a time when the Gurgaon-based firm is also in talks to trade its transactions unit to Axis Bank and Airtel Money, the mobile wallet of telecom operator Bharti Airtel.
As per the two sources having a deep knowledge of this matter, the offer by Amazon is up to $70–80 Million (Rs 466–532 Crore). A term sheet has been agreed by the Behemoth, the Seattle-headquartered e-commerce, and Jasper Infotech, which operates and owns both FreeCharge and Snapdeal, last week. The new set of developments come at a time after the third-largest private sector lender of the country, Axis Bank, came out as one of the interested entities to purchase FreeCharge for almost $60–65 Million, as reported by the media previously.
Rival Paytm has also conducted discussions to obtain FreeCharge, and has made an offer of $10 Million, media had claimed. On the other hand, the sources mentioned above also claimed that in spite of late but higher offer of Amazon for FreeCharge, Axis Bank continued to be the favorite to obtain the digital transactions platform, which fights with the likes of MobiKwik. When reached out by the media, an Amazon representative claimed, “We do not comment on speculations and rumors.” Independently, Jasper Infotech representative did not react to any media questions looking for clarity. A successful trade of FreeCharge will offer much-required money to the Snapdeal funds. This gives it dangerous runway of a couple of months and allows the company to endure as a potentially standalone venture.
As per the sources, if successful in its Endeavour to obtain FreeCharge, Amazon will most probably introduce FreeCharge into Amazon Pay, its current transaction entity. This, on the other hand, might not be separately verified by the media. The online retail major, which has promised to spend $5 Billion in its domestic operations, lately pumped an extra Rs 130 Crore into Amazon Pay India, as per the sources mentioned above.
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