Walmart Adds Free Video And Movie Streaming To Its Flipkart App

Walmart (WMT) has upped the ante on its Flipkart acquisition by offering free video and movie streaming. The video service will reportedly roll out to 160 million customers this month.

The addition of the video service on the Bengaluru, India-based Flipkart app is part of an effort by Walmart to increase the number of subscribers to the service by offering free movies, short videos, and web series, Reuters reported. The app won’t offer original content like Amazon Prime rival to start but will offer the video content at no additional charge to members.

Amazon currently charges 999 rupees a year ($14.15) for its Prime video subscription service or 129 rupees a month ($1.83). Unlike Amazon’s Prime video service, Flipkart will not need an additional app to watch the streaming content.

“Most consumers’ first touch point with the internet is through online video content and statistics suggest that video content and entertainment play a key role in bridging the gap for consumers to come online and experience ecommerce,” a company spokeswoman told Reuters.

Content on the Flipkart site is expected to include licensing from Walt Disney, and Indian production studio, Balaji Telefilms, Bloomberg reported.

“We have rolled out the test in among 1% of our customers currently and plan to take it to 100% of them in the next 20 days,” the spokeswoman added.

Shares of Walmart stock were down 2.04 percent as of 10:24 a.m. ET on Monday.