Amazon buys Perpule’s POS offering to up kirana game

Amazon has acquired the POS (point of sales) offering of Perpule, a retail technology solutions startup based in Bengaluru. As part of the acquisition, Perpule’s POS team will join the rolls of the Seattle headquartered ecommerce major. 

Amazon subsidiary “Amazon Technologies Inc has acquired Perpule’s cloud-based POS asset called Ultra POS and the POS team is joining Amazon,” a person privy to the details of the acquisition told TechCircle. 

Responding to queries from TechCircle, an Amazon spokesperson said, “Perpule has built an innovative cloud-based POS offering that enables offline stores in India to better manage their inventory, checkout process, and overall customer experience. We are excited to have the Perpule team join us to focus on providing growth opportunities for businesses of all sizes in India while raising the bar of the shopping experience for Indian customers.” 

Perpule CEO Abhinav Pathak confirmed the acquisition of the POS offering and the team in a series of social media posts

Major Update (Personal & @PerpuleIndia) (1/n)

I’m excited to share our POS offering and team will be joining #Amazon as a part of an acquisition. Thank you to our employees and customers who made this possible & brought us here.

— Abhinav Pathak (@abhinavpathak27) March 31, 2021

Neither Pathak nor Amazon disclosed the financial details of the acquisition. 

Earlier, multiple media reports, citing regulatory filings, said Amazon had acquired Perpule parent Delvit Solutions in an all-cash deal worth Rs 107.6 crore. 

Founded in 2016 by Pathak, Saketh BSV and Yogesh Ghaturle, Perpule has so far raised $5.31 million, as per data from VCCEdge. Its investors include Prime Venture Partners, Venture Highway, KStart Capital, Kalaari Capital and Taxiforsure co-founder Raghunandan Gangappa. In 2018, Bengaluru based early stage investor Prime Venture Partners led a $4.7 million Series A funding round in the startup. 

Perpule’s UltraPOS offering automates and digitizes store and inventory management for small businesses and kirana stores. 

 Express Stores, another player in the hyperlocal retail space, shares a common investor common with  Perpule in Venture Highway. “The grocery market was $600 billion in 2019, growing to $1 trillion in 2025. Express Stores’ addressable market is neighborhood kiranas, which constitutes 90% of daily consumer needs but is still largely unorganised,” Samir Sood, partner, Venture Highway told TechCircle in an earlier interaction, estimating the market opportunity.