WS Retail triples its turnover to combined sales of Shoppers Stop, Future Lifestyle, Trent & Pantaloons

WS Retail, the largest seller on India's biggest online marketplace Flipkart, nearly tripled its turnover to Rs 10,163 crore in FY15. It is more than the combined sales of top brick-and-mortal retailers such as Shoppers Stop, Future Lifestyle, Tata's Trent and Aditya Birla Group's Pantaloons.

According to industry experts, these numbers offer a sneak peek into Flipkart's likely performance for the year given WS Retail's dominant position on the e-commerce website.

The six-year-old company was set up by Flipkart's founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal because India doesn't allow foreign-backed e-commerce companies to sell directly to consumers. WS Retail was selling nearly 80% of its merchandise to Flipkart but seeing that regulators were not happy with existing government legislation, the Bansals sold their stake to former OnMobile Global COO Rajeev Kuchhal and a clutch of investors three years ago. Their contribution has since declined from 80% to 30% and Flipkart is aiming to more than triple its third-party sellers by the end of this year to reduce its dependence on WS Retail and convert itself into a full-fledged marketplace like Snapdeal.

"Flipkart has been reducing its dependence on WS Retail in its effort to simplify its business structure. It is expected that such a step and simultaneous addition of new vendors on its website directly shall automatically reduce the trading volume of WS Retail over time," Rakesh Nangia, founder and managing partner at tax and transaction advisory firm Nangia & Co, told ET.

In fact a few months ago, Flipkart informed several companies and brands, who sell on the site through WS Retail, to directly sell their products to consumers. However, WS Retail will continue to be the seller for Flipkart exclusives such as the Motorola and Xiaomi handsets.