Flipkart adds Kannada, Tamil, and Telugu as new language interfaces
Following the introduction of Hindi language interface on its platform last year, Flipkart expanded this in-house tech capability to have a stronger connect with the Bharat market.
Flipkart, India’s leading ecommerce marketplace, has added three more Indian languages to its platform in an attempt to have a deeper and wider reach of the online shopping market in the country.
Now, Flipkart has added Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada languages for consumer interface of its ecommerce platform. The company had already enabled the Hindi language option on its interface, which was introduced last year.
According to release issued by Flipkart, this new launch will help reduce the access barriers to ecommerce for native language speakers. It also said that these new language interface have been built on Flipkart’s ‘Localisation and Translation Platform’.
Flipkart Group CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy
According to industry reports, Indian language internet users are expected to account for nearly 75 percent of India’s internet user base by 2021, and initiatives such as these provide the comfort factor.
Kalyan Krishnamurthy, Chief Executive Officer of Flipkart Group, said, “In the past year, we have introduced multiple solutions under Voice, Video and Vernacular to increase ecommerce adoption for millions of consumers. We truly believe that language, if solved well, can be an opportunity rather than a barrier to reach millions of consumers who have been underserved.”
According to Flipkart, the growing base of language users, primarily from smaller towns, makes it extremely important to enable ecommerce in regional languages to offer a more personalised experience.
Jeyandran Venugopal, Chief Product and Technology Officer at Flipkart, said, “Today, almost 58 percent of our user base comes from Tier-II cities and beyond, and with new language interfaces of Tamil, Telugu and Kannada, along with Hindi (introduced last year), will further improve users’ ecommerce journeys by making it simpler and more personal.”
Flipkart undertook an ethnographic study to get relevant insights that helped them to develop a platform that enables consumers to interact in their own language and encourage independence in purchase decisions.
This interface has a mix of translations and transliteration of words. It also includes large scale translation of over 5.4 million words across product specifications, banners, and payment pages etc, in the three languages.
"As a homegrown ecommerce marketplace, we understand India and its diversity in a more nuanced way and are building products that have the potential to bring a long-term change. The introduction of Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada interfaces, in addition to Hindi and English, is a meaningful step in that direction in line with our mission to democratise ecommerce in India,” Kalyan said.
Edited by Kanishk Singh