As per the report, Adani will fight against Reliance, Walmart in India’s e-commerce and payments race

India’s Adani Group is in talks to enter the e-commerce and digital payments space as the conglomerate seeks to diversify its portfolio and compete with Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance, Amazon and Walmart’s Flipkart and PhonePe, according to a report.

According to the Financial Times, energy and infrastructure giant Adani Group is considering applying for a license to operate on India’s Unified Payments Interface – a public digital payments network that has become the most popular way for Indians to transact online. The group, one of the three largest conglomerates in India, is also finalizing plans for a co-branded credit card with banks, according to the report.

This is not the first time that the Adani Group has shown interest in digital offerings. In 2022, the company launched the Adani One consumer application through which it sells travel tickets. Gautam Adani, the Indian group’s chief executive, also hinted at a “future collaboration” with Uber during the ride-hailing company’s chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi’s recent visit to India.

Adani Group intends to offer online shopping through the government-backed Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) platform, according to one person familiar with the matter. According to the FT, which also reported that planned e-commerce and mobile payment services will be available through Adani One, Adani Group will initially seek to target the new ventures to its existing customer base of hundreds of millions of users.

The consumer pressures follow a tumultuous year for Adani, which was followed by allegations of market manipulation and fraud by US short-selling firm Hindenburg Research, which led to the loss of $150 billion of the company’s publicly traded shares. Adani has denied any wrongdoing.