Amazon SMB Impact Report highlights success of Indian Small and Medium Businesses despite COVID-19

Bengaluru: Amazon.in today published the 2020 Small and Medium Business (SMB) Impact Report highlighting how the company benefits more than 10 lakh SMBs including sellers, delivery and logistics partners, neighbourhood stores, enterprises, developers, content creators and authors in India. These SMBs in turn provide livelihoods to lakhs of people. The report marks some of the key milestones achieved by the SMBs working with Amazon and highlights the impact of digitization on entrepreneurs and businesses across sectors.

Amit Agarwal, Senior VP and Country Head – Amazon India, said, “It’s humbling to see over 10 lakh small businesses associated with Amazon in India. This year has been unprecedented and has impacted the way we work and live. Yet, we remain inspired by the undying entrepreneurial spirit, creativity, resolve and trust in us of businesses, creators, authors, etc. to overcome challenges and grow. Technology adoption and digitization will continue to play a crucial role in offering expanded access and opportunities to SMBs, and we remain committed to invest and partner in their success”.

Manish Tiwary, VP – Amazon India said, “It is heartening to see how consumers across India have engaged with Amazon in the last year, whether it was to buy things that they needed, consume digital content from Prime Video and Kindle, use Alexa in their daily lives and more. Through this challenging year, we introduced several innovations and measure to help our SMB partners serve customers and it is the customer trust and engagement with Amazon that reflects in the success of lakhs of entrepreneurs, small businesses and content creators included in this report.”

Earlier this year, Amazon had pledged to invest USD 1 billion to digitise 10 million SMBs, enable e-commerce exports worth USD 10 billion and create 1 million incremental jobs – by 2025.

Highlights of the SMB Impact Report 2020
The SMB Impact Report 2020 offers insights into the success of over 10 lakh small and medium businesses that work with Amazon in India. Amazon offers them various opportunities to build and grow their business by selling their products online on Amazon.in, exporting ‘Made in India’ products globally, running delivery and logistics companies, using the cloud to launch and scale their businesses, creating voice apps, or publishing their own books.

Indian businesses on Amazon.in continue to grow
– 4,152 Indian sellers surpassed INR 1 crore in sales in 2020; the number of crorepati sellers grew 29% YOY
– Emerging brands on Amazon Launchpad saw their business grow by 135% YoY; women entrepreneurs under Saheli program saw their business grow nearly 15X; and weavers and artisans part of Karigar program saw their business grow by 2.8X
o During the Amazon Great Indian festival, more than 1,24,000 sellers from 6,542 pin-codes across India received an order
 Over 66,000 sellers received highest ever single day sale

Amazon’s B2B marketplace registered 85% YOY growth in sales
– There has been a 64% increase in monthly order volumes in 2020.
– Over 3.7 lakh sellers on the B2B marketplace offer more than 20 Cr GST enabled products.

Amazon Global Selling program is helping take local, global
– There are now over 70,000 Indian exporters selling millions of ‘Made in India’ products worldwide across 15 international Amazon websites
– Indian SMBs and brands on the program have crossed INR 15000 Crore in cumulative exports; in 2019, over 800 Indian small businesses on Global Selling surpassed INR 1 Crore in sales
– During the annual Black Friday, Cyber Monday sale globally; Indian exporters on Amazon Global Selling registered over 50% YOY growth in sales
o Indian sellers witnessed nearly 3X surge in demand across North America, EU Middle East and North Africa

KDP is enabling Indian authors to self-publish in multiple languages and reach millions of readers across the world
– In the year ending November 30, 2020, Indian authors have cumulatively earned over INR 45 crores through books published on KDP, growing over 2X YOY
– Hundreds of independent authors have earned over INR 1 lakh each in royalties, in the year ending November 30, 2020

Amazon is creating new opportunities for entrepreneurs to build their business through delivery and logistics programs
– There are nearly 280 Delivery Service Partners who are operating over 1500 stations across 750 cities
– Close to 240 trucking partners are associated with Amazon India’s middle mile network ensuring delivery of packages to customers across the country
– Over 28,000 neighbourhood stores fulfil last-mile deliveries in over 350 cities through the I Have Space program; on average earning INR 12,000 – INR 15,000 per month as supplemental income

Amazon Easy enables assisted shopping for new to e-commerce customers. Over 55,000 local stores across India are today associated with Amazon Easy
– 565% growth YoY in new stores associated with Amazon Easy in 2020
– Over 45,500 Amazon Easy stores launched in Non-Metro cities
– Uttar Pradesh has the highest number of stores associated with Amazon Easy at 11,567, followed by West Bengal at 4263 and Maharashtra at 3,887

Alexa enables SMB builders, developers and entrepreneurs to innovate and create voice-first customer experiences
– There are over 1 lakh developer from India building for Alexa globally, who have built over 30,000 skills with the Alexa Skills Kit
– Thousands of smart home devices compatible with Amazon Alexa, and there are over 100 Alexa built-in devices like smart speakers, fitness trackers, and Smart TVs

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is helping lakhs of active customers in India to launch and scale their businesses
– Since June 2019, Amazon has provided more than USD 1 billion in AWS credits to help startups accelerate their growth and development globally.
– In India, AWS works with hundreds of thousands of active customers.

As part of the SMB Impact Report 2020, Amazon.in has unveiled the top 10 states and Union Territories with most number of sellers . With more than 110,000 sellers; Delhi has the largest number of Amazon.in sellers in the country followed by Maharashtra (87,000) and Gujarat (79,000).