Even as Walmart-owned Flipkart looks to create thousands of direct jobs through its Big Billion Days sale event during the festive season, the company will now offer internships to undergraduate students from Tier-II cities and beyond. Flipkart on Saturday announced that students will work in its supply chain under its ‘Launchpad’ internship programme ahead of the festive season and the Big Billion Days. The internship would be a 45-day paid programmeto help students “gain critical skills in supply chain management and create an ecosystem of trained professionals for the e-commerce industry,” Flipkart said in a statement. The programme was launched last year and saw over 2,000 students participation from across India to learn supply chain management during The Big Billion Days.
The programme intends to help students understand the supply chain processes that form the backbone of e-commerce. Flipkart said the programme is designed to shape “India’s future workforce in various essential supply chain roles.” The company is working with educational institutes in 21 locations based in Binola (Haryana), Bhiwandi (Maharashtra), Uluberia and Dankuni (West Bengal) and Malur (Karnataka), Medchal (Telangana) etc. to identify meritorious students and engage them at its fulfilment centres. “As internships create a lot of excitement among young students as they set foot into the professional world, our carefully devised internship program works towards the overall development of the students,” said Amitesh Jha, Senior Vice-President, Flipkart.
Flipkart had last month announced creating over 70,000 direct and lakhs of indirect seasonal jobs during the festive season across the company’s supply chain including delivery executives, pickers, packers and sorters. The company has registered customer base of more than 250 million offering more than 150 million products across over 80 categories. It had earlier this month announced dates for its Big Billion Days sale beginning October 16 till October 21. On the other hand, Amazon had also recently announced its month-long Great Indian Festival Sale starting October 17. E-commerce companies are likely to hit $4 billion in gross merchandise value during the first leg of the festive sales seeing 50 per cent growth year-on-year, as per consulting firm RedSeer.
