Paytm, Alibaba are bringing you over 5 million Chinese products at cheaper rates soon

Paytm is soon going to give you options to buy over five million Chinese products that too at affordable prices as the Indian e-commerce platform is taking its association with Alibaba Group one notch higher.

Paytm has identified around 30 credible Indian merchants that will sell products from China such as home and kitchen, micro innovation including USB cookers, etc, fashion and mobile accessories and western fashion at cheaper rates.

"Inventory is the third pillar of commerce, after logistics and payments, which requires optimisation in India. Sellers who source using Paytm ties are allowed to sell on other marketplaces as well including Flipkart, Snapdeal, Amazon, ShopClues," Bhushan Patil, who is heading the initiative for Paytm, told ET.

"We expect the Indian SME's cost to come down three times with our direct connect. Most SMEs don't import directly, they import from local distributors, and there may be 2-3 steps shuffling, we connect directly. We also offer bonded warehousing facilities, leveraging our tie-ups with import houses and trusted payments with our partnership with Citibank, which further reduces costs at scale,” he added.

Under this model, Indian sellers will be able to buy Chinese goods in bulk and sell them off in India.

Patil told ET that the programme helps Indian sellers on Paytm offer new products on the B2C marketplace at competitive pricing.

"IndiaMART is focused on domestic B2B, serving buyers and sellers in India. Alibaba & Paytm are working on helping Indian buyers connect with suppliers from China and buy from them. Both of us are serving different segments of the market," Brijesh Agarwal, cofounder of IndiaMART, told ET.