Indian Ecommerce To Cross Rs 1 Lakh Cr in 2015; Online Food Delivery Fastest Growing & Travel The Biggest Niche

As per the recent IAMAI report on the state of Indian ecommerce industry, it was revealed that with 61% share, travel industry is still the biggest segment. Online food delivery niche grew 40% in the last 12 months, which makes it the fastest growing segment of the Indian ecommerce market.

The report was prepared by IAMAI in association with IMRB International.

Overall, transactions worth Rs 81525 crore happened in 2014, which is 53% more compared to 2013. The report estimates that the industry will grow at a rate of 33% in the next 12 months, which makes the overall market to be valued at Rs 1,08,428 crore by the time 2015 ends.

Breakdown of E-tailing

Among the current verticals of Indian ecommerce, online travel segment still holds the biggest pie with 61% market share or Rs 49,730 crore. E-tailing which involves buying and selling or consumer products online increased their share to 29% or Rs 23642 crore. Overall, e-tailing grew 1.4 times compared to 2013.

Here is a breakdown of the e-tailing segment in 2013:

• Mobile and accessories: 41% or Rs 9936 crore
• Apparels, Footwear and Personal items: 20% of Rs 4699 crore
• Consumer durables and Kitchen durables: 14% or Rs 3404 crore
• Laptops, Notebooks and Tablets: 11.75% or Rs 2780 crore
• Home furnishing: 4.4% or Rs 1059 crore
• Books: 2.7% or Rs 648 crore

The report mentions that online food delivery and applications niche grew at 40%, which makes it the fastest growing market as of now. In 2014, Rs 350 crore worth of food were delivered online.

Digital Segments

Overall, the services industry, which includes food delivery, marketing services, movie/event tickets, online commuting is growing at a break neck speed of 70% since 2010 and is valued at Rs 2025 crore right now.

Financial service market, another crucial component of the Indian eCommerce market is growing consistently at 20% since 2010, and Rs 4508 crore worth of online transactions happened in 2014 in this niche (online insurance; premium, consultancy, financial management). Online classified market reflected stagnant growth, as its valued at Rs 896 crore.

Mode of Payment

Cash on Delivery still rules the mode of payment used by online shoppers, as it resulted in 45% of all payments in 2014. Debit Cards came at second position with 21% share, followed by 16% by Credit Cards; Internet Banking at 10%.

Mobile wallets, which have seen a surge of activity in the last few months, resulted in 8% of all payments. Last year we had reported that 20% of all payments are being done on mobile devices. Hence, with 8% share of mobile wallets in the overall online payments, it means that the niche is also growing rapidly. Reportedly, there are 300 million Internet users in India right now, and by end of 2016, 500 million mark would be breached.

You can view the complete report here.