IKEA Debuts its Online Presence with Mumbai Mumbai residents can utilise the online services offered by the online furniture marketplace with operations kicking off in full swing from Monday onwards

Global furniture retailer from Sweden which entered India last year with a store in Hyderbad, has now officially debuted into the Indian online market and this time it is all set to begin from Navi Mumbai. Residents of Mumbai can utilise the online services offered by the world's biggest furniture retailer with operations kicking off in full swing from Monday onwards.

Creating 10,000 Jobs

Exactly a year ago, IKEA launched its first maiden presence in the Indian subcontinent with Hyderabad. In November last year, Entrepreneur India reported that the furniture retail company was eyeing Navi Mumbai as the location for the opening of its second store and claimed to generate 10,000 jobs in the next three years. IKEA also hit headlines when Hyderabad-based startup Gayam was picked for supplying e-autos for its delivery fleet.

Impact on the Indian Market

IKEA's entrance in the Indian market has rattled several players and the latest move to open online services will definitely make a few players uneasy. Pepperfry, Urban ladder are some of the e-commerce players in furniture retail that have changed the shape of furniture shopping in India. With IKEA's entrance which has a global reach and presence, Indian startups in this field must pull-up their socks.

According to a report by Business Wire, the Indian furniture market is expected to garner US$61.09 billion by the end of 2023. India is a robust market when it comes to e-commerce but it has not come this far without battling its fair set of challenges. In another report by Bloomberg, it was reported that it took a little over a decade for IKEA to make an advent in the Indian furniture market. The FDI policies which prevented foreign firms from owning more than 51per cent of the Indian retail companies slowed the process of foreign investment in India. However, norms have relaxed and become more open over the years. Moreover, the Indian government has been taking steps to make the economy more open and even digitizing it to reap the benefits of its potential markets. It has also introduced campaigns and initiatives to digitize the economy, so that India can be at par with super powers like the U.S. or China which have completely gone digital in every sense. With such developments already in place, one can fathom that there is, indeed, a lot of scope and probability for more foreign investment pouring in India in the coming times. IKEA recognized the humongous potential and is leveraging this opportunity to plunge into the Indian digital ecommerce market to establish a strong footprint in the Asian country and spread its wings thereafter.

Apart from IKEA, online retailer Walmart and Jack Ma founded Alibaba are some foreign companies that have established strong presences in India.