Ola Cabs likely to collaborate with ONDC for logistics services

Ola Cabs is likely to become the logistics provider for ONDC

Ola Cabs is reportedly on the verge of announcing a collaboration with the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), an initiative by the Government of India to make e-commerce interoperable.

The ride-hailing company, according to CNBC-TV18, is likely to become the logistics provider for ONDC, to provide last mile delivery services across categories for both buyers and sellers utilizing the ONDC platform.

This action is in line with Ola's endeavors to expand its service offerings.

Ola CEO Bhavish Aggarwal expressed enthusiasm about the upcoming developments in collaboration with ONDC on the social networking platform X (formerly Twitter). Aggarwal highlighted the significance of ONDC as the future of commerce in India and affirmed Ola's commitment to this collaboration. He told followers to stay tuned for updates in the near future.

Aggarwal wrote on social networking platform X, "Very exciting stuff coming up with our collaboration at @Olacabs with @ONDC_Official! ONDC is the future of commerce in India and we are committing to it big! Stay tuned for lots of updates in the near future."

Very exciting stuff coming up with our collaboration at @Olacabs with @ONDC_Official!

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ONDC is the future of commerce in India and we are committing to it big! Stay tuned for lots of updates in the near future.@KoshyTK, @hemant2008 and I together today at our offices pic.twitter.com/kDrtOm1RuW

— Bhavish Aggarwal (@bhash) November 20, 2023

Ola's earlier ambitious moves

In 2022, it  was planning to integrate its cloud kitchen business with 10-minute grocery delivery. Earlier, in July 2015 the ride-hailing startup launched a standalone online grocery store in Bengaluru, and a food delivery app in March the same year. But, less than nine months later, it shut both Ola Store and Ola Foods without going into detail.

ONDC's has been onboarding players within the mobility business. It has an open mobility initiative and is expected to benefit customers by enabling them to book rides from their favourite apps and integrating various modes of transportation, including metro, auto, and buses.

ONDC: First-of-its kind e-commerce experiment

The ONDC is an experiment — the first of its kind — to make e-commerce interoperable, giving sellers like restaurants and kirana stores more control over business decisions. It was launched in April last year. Aiming to become a single point of access for all digital services,  ONDC currently allows participants to use its platform to offer food, groceries and mobility services. The idea of ONDC is simple, although its implementation looks complex. Essentially, the network breaks down the entire order-delivery operation into three parts: buyer-side apps that are consumer facing, seller-side apps that enlist merchants and business, and logistics providers, who make the last-mile delivery to the end consumer.

ONDC's rapid growth

It was reported in October this year that ONDC’s weekly average orders had been crossing over 1 lakh transactions per day. It was said the orders were steadily growing as it added more sellers and service providers to the network as compared to 75,000-plus transactions per day that the network was clocking at the start of July.

It was also said that on a monthly basis, the network was clocking over 3 million transactions a month, which were only 1 million in July-August.

ONDC has also forayed into international B2B exports with Proxtera, a Singapore-based buying application, coming in as its first international buyer app.

ONDC targets 200,000 daily transactions by end of 2023

The network is gearing up to hit 200,000 transactions a day by the end of the 2023, from the current high of 160,000 transactions, and the government is also working to bring financial products to ONDC in the next couple of months.

For its next phase of growth, ONDC has multiple strategies in place. For example, to popularise the network in tier 2 and 3 cities and beyond.