The fight between American giants Amazon and Reliance over Future Retail Stores has now come to the public. Today on Tuesday, through advertisements in all the major newspapers of the country on behalf of Amazon, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance and Future were accused of cheating. After which the ongoing war between Amazon and Reliance over retail stores seems to be increasing now.
Reliance captures retail stores: Reliance Retail Ventures, a subsidiary of Reliance Industries, had on February 25 taken over 200 retail stores for non-payment of lease rent by Future Retail. After taking over these stores, Reliance was told that it is preparing to take over 250 more Future Retail stores in case of non-payment of rent. Future Retail has more than 1700 retail stores in the country.
The title of the advertisement given by Amazon is ‘Public Notice’ in which it has been said about the capture of retail stores that “these acts have been done in a secret manner by cheating the Constitutional Courts in India”. No response has been given from Sources related to the matter said that the purpose of the advertisements in the newspapers is to alert all the stakeholders, including the lenders of Future, that the transfer of assets by Future to Reliance is illegal.
Reliance – Future’s Deal: Reliance Retail Ventures bought its retail business from Future Group on 29 August 2020 for Rs 24,713 crore. Under this deal, the retail and wholesale business, logistics and warehouse verticals of Future Retail were bought by Reliance.
Amazon had objected to the deal, saying it had already bought a 49 per cent stake in Future Coupons Pvt Ltd, the promoter company of Future Retail, a year ago and Future Retail cannot sell its business to Reliance without its consent. Future Coupons holds 7 per cent stake in Future Retail.