BENGALURU : Flipkart has partnered with infrastructure firm Adani Group to set up a data centre in Chennai and a large fulfilment centre in Kalyan, near Mumbai.
The e-commerce company said it will work with Adani Logistics Ltd, which provides end-to-end logistics services, and is a subsidiary of Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd (APSEZ), to strengthen its supply chain and serve its growing customer base.
As part of this, Adani Logistics will construct a 534,000 sq. ft fulfilment centre (FC) at its forthcoming logistics hub in NRC Complex at Mohone-Thane in Kalyan.
This will be leased out to Flipkart to help meet its increasing demand in western India and support access to several thousands of sellers.
Kalyan is a futuristic and offbeat warehousing location, and Flipkart will have a first-mover advantage, property consultants said. Adani owns nearly 300 acres there and more activity is expected in the coming months.
The warehousing facility is expected to be operational in the second half of 2022 and will have the capacity to house 10 million units of sellers’ inventory at any point in time. It has the potential to create 2,500 direct and thousands of indirect jobs.
Walmart-owned Flipkart, which has two data centres in Hyderabad and Chennai, will set up its third data centre at the Chennai facility of AdaniConneX Pvt. Ltd, a new joint venture between EdgeConneX and Adani Enterprises Ltd.
Flipkart will develop the new data centre at the AdaniConneX facility as part of one of the largest private cloud deployments in India to strengthen its e-commerce business.
The AdaniConneX data centre is a new facility to enable Flipkart to design the data centre to meet its growing infrastructure needs with a significant focus on security and keeping data within the country.
Karan Adani, chief executive officer, APSEZ said: “This broad-ranging partnership across our logistics and data centre businesses is a unique business model, and we see this as a great opportunity to serve Flipkart’s physical as well as digital infrastructure needs."
E-commerce companies, such as Amazon India and Flipkart, have been ramping up warehousing capacity over the last year amid a surge in online shopping.
In March, alternative investment firm Xander Group Inc. leased around 1.1 million sq. ft of warehousing space to Amazon India and Flipkart in Bhiwandi, Maharashtra.
Kalyan Krishnamurthy, chief executive officer of Flipkart Group, said: “At the Flipkart Group, we are focused on ensuring that our customers get access to a wide range of products made available by sellers across the country as we continuously innovate to drive greater affordability. Our logistics network and technology stack are instrumental in making this a reality."
