Indian e-commerce company Snapdeal.com has acquired Silicon Valley-based advertising technology start-up Reduce Data.
The acquisition will help Snapdeal to build a discovery platform and tools for brands and over two lakh sellers on the marketplace. The financial details of the transaction were not revealed by the company.
The engineering team at Reduce Data spread across the U.S., the U.K. and India will now be part of Snapdeal.
Founded in 2012 by tech entrepreneur Asif Ali, the firm has built an artificial intelligence platform that helps advertisers deliver advertising strategies for consumers across devices. This includes delivering return on investment for advertising campaigns.
“We are always on the lookout for talented people who come with specialized skills that augment our capabilities,” said Snapdeal co-founder Rohit Bansal. “We are confident that Asif (Ali) and his team will further strengthen our technological capabilities.”
The war to acquire talent and technology is heating up in India’s rapidly growing e-commerce industry. The industry, which is worth $7 billion (Rs.46,347 crore), is expected to reach $220 billion (Rs.14.5 lakh crore) by 2030 according to a report by investment bank Goldman Sachs.
Snapdeal, which has raised a total funding of $1.7 billion (Rs.11,256 crore) from top investors including Alibaba, SoftBank, Foxconn and Premji Invest, has acquired almost a dozen start-ups. In April, it bought online mobile recharge firm FreeCharge for about $400 million. Some other acquisitions include Exclusively.in, LetsGoMo, MartMobi and RupeePower. It’s rival Flipkart which has raised over $3.5 billion (Rs.23,000 crore) has acquired about seven start-ups.
“We are very excited to become a part of the Snapdeal family. The company has grown at a phenomenal pace in the last few years,” said Mr. Ali of Reduce Data. “We look forward to building world class technology products at Snapdeal and set new benchmarks for the industry in this space.”
