Amazon has been in China for 14 years, but it hasn't been able to defeat homegrown rivals like JD.com and Alibaba. It is determined not to make the same mistakes in India.
The big picture: India has the world's fastest growing e-commerce market. To make sure it dominates, Amazon is over-investing there, but it's running into competition as U.S. rival Walmart does the same.
Amazon didn't invest enough, and got outspent.
"Amazon is employing the right strategy," in India, says Hanna Luchnikava-Schorsch, an expert on India's economy at IHS Markit. In 2017, Amazon committed $5 billion to grow its market share in India, per Forrester.
Flipkart has had success in India due to business strategies tailored to the local market, Luchnikava-Schorsch explains.
The bottom line: Amazon and Walmart are battling for India, but the vibrancy of the Indian market doesn't come close to matching that of the Chinese one, Luchnikava-Schorsch says. India has a much smaller middle class —per IHS Markit's estimates, 95% of Indian households earn less than $20,000. And only about a quarter of the country's population has accessed the internet (a much smaller share engage in digital transactions).
