The government is inviting more buyer and seller apps to join the Open Network for Digital Commerce.
This comes on the heels of digital payments provider PhonePe's foray into e-commerce through the recently unveiled 'Pincode' app.
ONDC is a virtual network backed by the Commerce Ministry that brings together multiple buyer and seller platforms and logistics partners under the same space in a bid to democratise e-commerce.
Merchants or individual business owners can also join the network or be connected with a seller app, which is present on the ONDC network.
"We are inviting each buyer and each seller to join the network," Sanjiv Singh, joint secretary, Department for Promotion of Industries and Internal Trade, Ministry of Commerce, said at a press conference on Thursday.
The goal is to reach every pincode and ensure citizens are served by the network, Singh said. The latest entrant into the buyer app service space is PhonePe, which launched its app 'Pincode' to serve as a hyperlocal e-commerce discovery platform built on top of the ONDC.
Sameer Nigam, founder and chief executive officer at PhonePe, unveiled the app, which is currently live only for customers in Bengaluru. The company aims to reach more cities and get up to one lakh orders per day on the app by December.
The network is planning to bring transparency to pricing mechanisms and even out unfair market concentration by offering individual customers access to a wide range of options.
How Is ONDC Faring ?
While peak numbers haven't been achieved yet, more merchants are onboarding ONDC on a daily basis.
In December 2022, the network had 800 merchants, as noted by Thampy Koshy, chief executive officer at ONDC. Today, it includes 40,000–50,000 merchants, primarily in the grocery and food domains.
The platform has also recently begun a new service domain for beauty and personal products, and it is hopeful that this segment will bring in more merchants.
Koshy said that interest among the merchant community is growing. "The hope is that in one month, the numbers will double... and the momentum will continue," he said.
There are merchants in more than 200 cities, but only about 15 cities have more than 100 merchants, Koshy said. The merchant concentration is higher in cities like Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Coimbatore, Bhopal, and Calcutta, among others.
In terms of logistics partners, popular players like Dunzo, Shiprocket, LoadShare, Grab, Delhivery, Shadowfax, e-kart, and Magicpin are among those who've shown interest. The government's postal carrier, India Post, is also said to have started integration with the ONDC network.
Other big players who have joined the network include Hindustan Unilever Ltd., Procter & Gamble Hygiene & Health Care Ltd., Paytm, and ITC Ltd., as reported by PTI.
In terms of the number of transactions occurring on a daily basis, Koshy said that there are multiple platforms on the network, and the numbers have grown from 30 to 40 transactions a day (only in the grocery and food categories) to 500 to 600 a day.
Mobility, which was one of the early pilot categories, has seen the maximum growth, clocking 19,000 to 20,000 rides a day, the DPIIT said. The mobility segment is operational in two cities—Cochin and Bengaluru.
Bengaluru's Namma Yatri, which is now on the ONDC, offers three-wheeler autorickshaw rides where neither drivers nor riders pay any commission, jolting the ride-hailing market, according to a Bloomberg report.
Namma Yatri's app currently has 45,000 drivers for autorickshaw rides and is eyeing expansion to other cities and including more modes of transportation. Nearly half a million users have already used the Namma Yatri app for rides, according to the Bloomberg report.
The ONDC network merely acts as an open-source network for buyers and sellers to participate in by developing their own systems.
The network serves to unbundle the market and afford interoperability between different parties, Koshy said. "We are enabling the unbundling of building blocks of commerce and making a protocol for these building blocks to talk to each other seamlessly so the buyer or seller can have an easy experience."
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