Domestic companies in stiff competition with International Brands

Truecaller has released the latest edition of TrueInsights Q3 report. The report sheds light on the call volumes of e-commerce and cab hailing services in India. With Internet population set to reach 730 million by 2020, the Indian market offers great prospects for businesses operating in the “i”, “m” and “e” space – transcending services over the air on your computers, smartphones, tablets and many other connected devices.

The report found that Indian Internet-based services operating in the two industries dominate the global competition in terms of call volumes. Local companies like Ola and Flipkart in their respective industries dominated the international competition with high communications from and to their consumers.

Call volumes to a car service fell slightly to 2.07 billion calls during Q3. Companies should improve their services so that less calls are required per ride by placing more emphasis on automating their processes, real-time tracking options, etc.

In terms of incoming versus outgoing calls over this entire period, the report finds that Ola Cabs made 65 million calls to its users in Q3, while users made 19 million calls, which accounted for 85 million calls between Ola Cabs and its users. Uber users received 23 million calls from the company in Q3, and called the company 5.6 million times, which totalled 29 million calls.

The report reveals increasing preference for ridesharing services with around 34 million users made or received a call to a ridesharing number in Q3. Delhi topped the list of cities using the rideshare service with 3.8 million users made or received a total of 348 million calls in this period to ridesharing numbers.

Ola Cabs is most popular in Delhi, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, while Uber sees more usage in Mumbai after Delhi and Andhra Pradesh.

It further finds that growth in volumes continues with the number of calls made or received going from 600 million in Q2 to more than 700 million in Q3, roughly a 17% increase. 27 million users made or received calls to e-commerce numbers during Q3.

In terms of call volume share between the top three companies, Flipkart continued its dominance over its global competitor Amazon, while Snapdeal slipped even further.

Delhi topped the list of cities making the highest number of calls, with 3.2 million users making or receiving 106 million calls over the quarter, roughly 33 calls per user per quarter, or an e-commerce number call every three days or so.

Regionally, top three markets for Flipkart (by descending order of call volume) are Delhi, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka, while, for Amazon, Andhra Pradesh, Delhi and Karnakata dominate their volume. For Snapdeal, Dehli, Maharashtra and Karnakata round out as their top 3 markets.