Snapdeal Set To Raise Nearly $650M In Round Led By Japan’s Softbank: Report

Snapdeal, the Indian online shopping company backed by eBay Inc., is set to raise between $600 million and $650 million in funding led by Japan’s Softbank Corp., Reuters reported on Wednesday, citing three people it didn’t name.

Existing investors will also participate in the latest round of funding and Snapdeal could make an announcement next week, Reuters said. In addition to eBay, Snapdeal’s other investors include Temasek Holdings and Ratan Tata, former chairman of India’s Tata Group.

Snapdeal is battling it out with Amazon Inc., and Flipkart, which raised $1 billion earlier this year, for a bigger share of India’s growing online shopping market. The number of online shoppers in the country is set to double to 40 million by 2016 from 2013, with the market size growing more than four-fold to $8.6 billion, according to private equity firm Accel Partners.