Amazon Indian launches a seller lending network

Amazon India launched a Seller Lending Network which will allow the sellers on the e-commerce major’s platform to seek loans from multiple third party lenders. It has partnered with financial organizations like Capital First, Yes Bank, Capital Float, Aditya Birla Finance, Bank of Baroda and Flexiloans for the program.

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Amazon stated that with this launch, the seller will be able to perform all loan related activities including viewing multiple loan offers and apply for loans in addition to the automatic loan repayment by simply linking their Amazon sale proceeds to their loan account on the Amazon’s Seller Central portal. The commerce giant is locked in an intense battle for the market leadership with Flipkart and has about 3.4 lakh sellers on the platform.

With this network, sellers will be able to get access to a large selection of loan options from multiple vendors and loan types as well as competitive rate of interest. The sellers can avail loans through an online application process which has a minimal documentation requirement and a quick loan approval process of 2-3 days for new loans and intra day approval for existing loan renewals.

This is the first time Amazon has built a lending program for its sellers and the endeavor is to make the end to end process convenient and quicker by allowing the sellers to focus on their business and grow. The company is also focusing on giving an enhanced experience to the lending partners which include NBFCs and Banks through seamless information sharing on the seller performance and easy repayment solutions. It also as a Lender Central which is a portal for lenders to facilitate the exchange of information between Amazon and the lenders. Lender Central will facilitate information about the seller performance data, loan portfolio details and the loan application status. Through it the lenders will be able to track the performance of a seller on Amazon real time and will allow them to better assess the sellers in making the loan decision more comprehensive. The Indian unit of the e-tailer had earlier launched a Sender Lending program in 2016.