Amazon and Flipkart unlikely to respond fully to India antitrust study, say sources
Companies fear revealing trade secrets as the competition commission seeks to understand the e-commerce sector
New Deli — Amazon and Walmart’s Flipkart are unlikely to fully participate in an Indian antitrust body’s study of the e-commerce sector for fear of revealing trade secrets, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is engaged in what it describes as a “fact-finding exercise” aimed at better understanding the e-commerce sector, showed a document distributed to several e-commerce firms. The CCI document features 88 questions over 12 pages requesting recipients volunteer pricing strategies, product information and the identities of their biggest-selling vendors. Amazon and Flipkart are among India’s largest e-commerce companies so their participation in any such survey could carry significant weight. Yet the pair are unlikely to answer questions in full as doing so would involve disclosing commercially sensitive information, the two people said. “This survey is very detailed,” said one of the people, who declined to be identified a...
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