Now Reading: Vertical commerce platforms gain ground in India’s e-commerce market
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Vertical commerce platforms gain ground in India’s e-commerce market
Vertical commerce platforms gain ground in India’s e-commerce market
A new wave of vertical commerce platforms is emerging in India, choosing to focus on specific categories rather than the everything-store model of Amazon, Flipkart and quick commerce players. Platforms such as…
A new wave of vertical commerce platforms is emerging in India, choosing to focus on specific categories rather than the everything-store model of Amazon, Flipkart and quick commerce players. Platforms such as Slikk (fashion), Plazza (pharma) and Snabbit (home services) are betting on specialisation over breadth, according to a report by Brand Equity.
Industry experts quoted in the report say the timing is right because horizontal commerce has already built the infrastructure and changed consumer expectations around convenience and speed. Arjun Vaidya, entrepreneur and investor, said that widespread adoption of horizontal commerce over the last 12 months has created space for verticals to emerge. Ayyappan R of FirstClub noted that speed is no longer a differentiator as everyone delivers in 10 minutes, leaving trust as the harder problem for specialist platforms to solve.
The shift follows the D2C wave and quick commerce revolution, combining specialised discovery with the convenience consumers now expect. FirstClub is building around quality-led curation with ingredient standards, while fashion platform ZILO argues the category cannot be treated as just another section on a broad platform.
Indian Opinion Analysis
The return of vertical commerce mirrors the strategy Nykaa and 1mg deployed a decade ago in beauty and healthcare, respectively, both of which went on to become publicly listed companies. The difference now is that quick commerce has normalised 10-minute delivery across 30+ Indian cities, creating a fulfillment backbone that vertical players can lease rather than build from scratch. The real test is whether specialist platforms can achieve unit economics that match horizontal players, which spread fixed costs across thousands of SKUs. Most of these ventures are early-stage, so the metric to watch is repeat purchase rates in their narrow categories, not gross merchandise value.
The next signal will come when one of these platforms raises a Series B round at a valuation that implies category leadership, which would validate the thesis beyond the current founder commentary.
Source: brandequity.economictimes.indiatimes.com
This brief was synthesised by AI from the source linked above.
