Snapdeal further squeezes itself; vacates office space in different locations

Snapdeal, the beleaguered ecommerce firm, is further squeezing itself by vacating some of its office space to cut down on rental costs. Also, with the firm trimming down its workforce, it will naturally need less working space than it currently has. In 2014, it had about 8,000 employees, and now the firm only has ~2500 employees on its payroll. The company has vacated a 90-seat office in a co-working hub in Andheri in Mumbai that it picked up last year and is in the process of divesting about half of the space in its main corporate office in Gurgaon as part of its cost cutting drive.

Naveen Nandwani, MD JLL India, said that “The e-commerce industry is evolving as it matures to an established sector in India. Companies now are focusing on right-sizing their real estate requirement to ensure their space take-ups are optimized to their head count projections”. Snapdeal is not alone in the ecommerce industry to vacate a work space. Flipkart, India’s largest ecommerce players, surrendered 70% of space in its upcoming campus in Bangalore to trim cost.

Snapdeal is currently in discussions with Flipkart for a potential sale and the negotiations are driven by Softbank. If the sale goes through, it will create the largest single domestic ecommerce entity able to challenge the hegemony of Amazon.