Walmart Could Invest $25B In Developing Tata Group’s ‘Super App’

Walmart Inc. is in talks for as much as a $25 billion stake in a Mumbai, India conglomerate that is planning to launch a “super app” designed to offer a mega selection of retail products, sources told Mint.

The Tata Group’s app, on track to debut by year’s end or January of 2021, will offer food and grocery ordering, fashion and lifestyle, consumer electronics and consumer durables, insurance and financial services, education, healthcare and bill payments.

“Walmart is keen to get a strong brand backing its eCommerce business, while Tata Group wants a global name and an established player in the online space,” a source told Mint.

If the deal is signed, it would represent India’s largest retail space ever, eclipsing Walmart’s 2018 purchase of a 66 percent stake in Flipkart for $16 billion.

Last month, Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons, the parent company, told the Financial Times that the app will put the company in competition with giants of the region like Reliance Industries and global titans like Amazon. Chandrasekaran said the app would be a huge opportunity for the company.

“The Tata Group, depending upon how you count, touches several hundred millions of consumers in India, if you take consumers who are walking in every day into a Tata facility,” he said.

In May, Tata Capital, a division of Tata Group, introduced a mobile app that promised a better user experience for getting loans. It allows users to apply and track application requests, raise draw-down requests and track transactions and repayment schedules.

“The app is easy to use, secure and provides a wealth of add-on features, which will be useful for all customers,” Abonty Banerjee, chief digital and marketing officer of Tata Capital, told Express Computer.

On Monday (Sept. 28), Bloomberg News reported that the Tata Group is in talks with potential investors about taking stakes in a new digital platform as it updates its consumer businesses. Sources told the news service that Tata Sons Pvt., the holding company of the $113 billion conglomerate, is working with advisers to explore bringing in financial or strategic investors, including global technology companies.