Ease of doing business for MSMEs: The number of retail merchants on the government’s open e-commerce network Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) has grown by 40 times in 2023 so far, the latter said in a statement on Thursday. In September last year, ONDC had started its beta testing with grocery and food delivery segments in Bengaluru.
Since then, the network has seen “quantum leaps especially in the last few months,” ONDC said with the number of “retail merchants increased from over 800 in January 2023 to more than 35,000 as of now, while the number of orders increased from 50 per day in Jan to peak at 25,000+ orders per day in the last week.”
Other domains including fashion, beauty & personal care, and electronics & appliances, which were added to the network in January this year, have over 600 merchants. These segments have recorded more than 1,300 transactions so far. Most of these orders have been intercity, with major intercity logistics providers like ShipRocket, Delhivery, Loadshare, etc. being live as part of the network, ONDC said.
“Now (with ONDC) market access can be enhanced on your own terms and conditions. Similar to the offline market where you can sell your products either through your own stores, via supermarkets or through a chain of small merchant stores, ONDC provides you with equal opportunity to connect with relevant buyers,” T Koshy, MD and CEO, ONDC had said at an event organised by FE Aspire in December last year.
ONDC hosts multiple participants on its network such as buyers, sellers, logistics companies, etc. Currently, multiple companies are live on the network, for instance, Digiit, GoFrugal, Ushop, Growth Falcons etc., as sellers while Paytm, PhonePe, Craftsvilla etc., are registered as buyers. When a shopper searches for a product on any of the buyers’ apps such as Paytm, the ONDC platform connects him/her to listed sellers that show up merchants from where the shopper can purchase the product.
Hailing ONDC as a solution to the challenges faced by small business sellers on various e-commerce platforms, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal also in April this year had said the network will provide a much larger market for sellers without any preferred or priority sellers, ensuring equitable and fair treatment for all stakeholders.
ONDC said it has dedicated programmes to empower previously undigitized sellers and has successfully onboarded a large number of first-time small merchants. Remarkably, despite the recent surge in volumes, the network has maintained key performance indicators such as order fill rate and delivery timelines that are consistent with current industry standards, it said.
