Rocket Internet's price comparison engine PricePanda launches in India
Rocket Internet is an eCommerce focused venture capital firm and startup incubator that was founded in 2007. The company has now brought its online price comparison site, PricePanda, to India (Panda is a play on the other ventures it has in the space as well, like FoodPanda). After launches in eight other countries during 2012 and 2013, PricePanda has now launched in India. With its move into India, PricePanda aims to create full price transparency and enable customers to make well informed purchasing decisions.
Christian Schiller, co-founder of PricePanda: “We are really optimistic about this launch because e-commerce in India is currently booming similar to how it was in Malaysia where we first operated in 2012.” A press release from Rocket Internet says-
On PricePanda, users find prices, information, ratings and reviews for the best and latest products offered by the most trusted online shops.The portfolio includes products from several categories such as computer, software, health and beauty, home appliances, music, games and many more. All offers and listings are active and always up to date. As PricePanda gives a well-structured overview over all available offers for the requested product, customers can compare different deals for the requested products in order to make a well informed purchasing decision. Clicking on a deal will redirect the user to the merchant´s online shop where the product can be ordered.
There is no denying the rise of eCommerce and we've also seen a lot of consolidation in the space with the big players clearly emerging out from the crowd- HomeShop18 filing for IPO, Flipkart crossing $1 billion in GMV, SnapDeal and Jabong raising huge follow up rounds ae just testimony to that. This rise has also given a boost to the eCommerce enablers and price comparison is an already highly crowded space.
MySmartPrice is backed by Accel, PriceDekho is backed by Sequoia, next in line is BuyHatke and a host of other players. Rocket Internet has a tendency to enter markets and take them by storm by using brute force. PricePanda recently raised $3 million in new funding from the German retail major Tengelmann Group and this has fulled its growth. Also, with mCommerce on the rise, the next year will also tell us how the eCommercce enablers evolve and who goes on to take the bigger piece of the pie.