<article><a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Rakuten">Rakuten</a>, often referred to as Japan&#8217;s <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Amazon">Amazon</a>, is planning to enter India&#8217;s booming e-commerce sector.</article>

<a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Rakuten">Rakuten</a>, often referred to as Japan&#8217;s <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Amazon">Amazon</a>, is planning to enter India&#8217;s booming e-commerce sector.
India allows foreign investment only in marketplace models.
Rakuten has started poaching mid-level managers from <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Flipkart+">Flipkart</a> and Amazon, said a report in the Economic Times.
Rakuten is huge in Japan, where it has become much more than an Amazon-clone since its 1997 founding. It offers much more, from sports and financial services to family planning. One in four online purchases in Japan takes place on its primary online marketplace Ichiba. That&#8217;s higher than what <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Alibaba">Alibaba</a>&#8216;s Taobao achieved in China.
But it is virtually unknown outside of Japan. Amazon dominates the e-commerce markets of the US and Europe, while Alibaba grew much bigger in China which ultimately led Rakuten to pull out of its partnership with <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Baidu">Baidu</a>.
While Japan is still a large market, its population is declining and the economy has been depressed for  the last decade. In the last two years, Rakuten&#8217;s chairman and chief executive Hiroshi Mikitani has been busy expanding its footprint outside, mainly in the US.
It has spent about $3 billion on deals abroad since 2011, mainly focussing on companies that are not market leaders and available at lower prices. In 2014, it bought the Cyprus-based messaging app <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Viber">Viber</a> for $905 million. Last year, it led a $530 million round of funding for <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=uber">Uber</a> rival <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=Lyft">Lyft</a>, spending $300 million for a 12 percent stake in the car-hailing app. In September, the company spent $1 billion to buy Ebates, an online coupon service in San Francisco.
Other than the US and Japan, the company is present in the UK, Brazil, Spain, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Online spending in India is expected to soar to nearly $75 billion by 2020 from just $12.1 billion last year, as more of the country’s 1.25 billion people get access to the internet, according to Forrester Research. Rakuten opened a development centre in Bangalore two years ago, and set up a business office last year.
It won&#8217;t be easy for Rakuten, which had revenue of $5 billion in 2014-15, to break into the Indian market where competition is fierce, and competitors like Amazon, Flipkart and Snapdeal have deep pockets, thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars in investments by the likes of Alibaba and Softbank.
Its earlier forays into Asian e-commerce markets such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore did not go well. Rakuten announced in February that it will <a style="color: #000080;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/stories/japanese-online-shopping-rakuten-closed-indonesia-malaysia-and-singapore-operation-30550/">shut down online marketplaces</a> in the three countries.
Also read:
<a style="color: #ff0000;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=rakuten">Goodpatch gets $3.5m; Rakuten-Gmarket pact; iChef raises $5.6m Series A </a>
<a style="color: #ff0000;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=rakuten">Japan’s Rakuten to exit Thailand’s ecommerce co Tarad.com in Feb</a>
<a style="color: #ff0000;" href="http://www.dealstreetasia.com/?s=rakuten">Rakuten Ventures launches new $85m fund for Japanese tech startups</a>
&nbsp;

Rakuten, often referred to as Japan's Amazon, is planning to enter India's booming e-commerce sector. 

As Japan slows, Rakuten is planning e-commerce foray in India

Bring stories like this into your inbox every day.

Sign up for our newsletter - The Daily Brief

As Japan slows, Rakuten is planning e-commerce foray in India

Start your deal-making journey now!

Bring stories like this into your inbox every day.

Sign up for our newsletter - The Daily Brief