e-commerce
Pepperfry.com collaborates with Evok
MUMBAI: Keeping up with the promise of offering the largest selection of furniture and home products, Pepperfry.com has now announced a tie-up with Hindware Home Retail Private Limited (HHRPL).
Operating under the brand name Evok, HHRPL is a 100 percent subsidiary of HSIL. The collaboration will help Evok leverage Pepperfry’s large online customer base and expand its presence across the country. Evok retails its products through 19 outlets in key cities of India.
Commenting on the association, Evok COO and business head Ajay Seth said, ‘Pepperfry will help us in reaching out to a larger customer base as in the last few years, E-commerce market has evolved in India and due to paucity of time, lot of customers are shopping from comforts of their homes Pepperfry will enable us in connecting with these customers.’
In addition to the existing portfolio of over 11,000 furniture designs, Pepperfry will showcase the entire furniture range from Evok, which has been designed using high-quality materials and finishes to suit every type of style interior style and theme on the website. Through this partnership, it plans to expand its furniture range to offer differentiated furniture designs across the country and strengthen its leadership position.
Talking about their focus on developing a strong merchant base in the online furniture segment, Pepperfry.com COO and founder Ashish Shah said, “Our alliance with Evok, one of the leading brands in the home interiors segment makes perfect sense as the products offered by the brand matches our ethos of providing a large range of high quality modern designs at affordable prices.”
Currently, Pepperfry hosts a range of local and international brands and also offers a wide range of made-to-order solid wood furniture. “We have built a strong foundation in supply chain that has enabled us to distribute large quantities of furniture to hundreds of towns across the country. With this infrastructure we will continue to empanel more and more merchants and brands from across the country to fulfill our value proposition of providing our customers with an extensive choice of furniture designs at the click of a mouse,” he further added.
Pepperfry.com will showcase entire furniture range from Evok including designs for living room, dining room & bedroom. It already offers a large portfolio of around 70+ furniture brands with leading names like Mudra, Nilkamal, Spacewood, @Home, Durian, Furniture Kraft and HomeTown selling on the website.
e-commerce
ONDC names Vibhor Jain MD and CEO; Rohit Lohia joins as CBO, Manoj Thakur as CTO
Leadership formalised as open commerce network sharpens focus on scale and user value
The Open Network for Digital Commerce has formalised Vibhor Jain as managing director and chief executive officer, cementing a leadership transition at India’s ambitious open commerce platform as it pushes for scale and relevance.
Jain, who had been serving as acting chief executive officer since April last year following the exit of Thampy Koshy, steps into the role with effect from 7th April , according to a report by The Economic Times. He previously served as chief operating officer at the government-backed network, which enables buyers and sellers to transact across applications through an open, interoperable system.
Setting out his strategy, Jain underscored the network’s differentiated architecture. “Going forward, we are concentrating on what open, interoperable infrastructure can uniquely enable, things that no single platform has the incentive or the architecture to do,” he said.
He added that the immediate priority is to widen ONDC’s impact across user cohorts often underserved by platform-led commerce. “My priority is to deepen the value ONDC creates for the people it exists to serve: kisaans, karigars, kiranas, gig workers, first-time investors, and daily commuters across India,” he said.
Jain also flagged leadership reinforcement within the organisation, noting that ONDC has “a strong and exciting leadership team in place”, with Rohit Lohia joining as chief business officer and Manoj Thakur as chief technology officer.
With over 18 years of experience spanning entrepreneurship and consulting, Jain brings a track record in technology-led, large-scale transformation programmes and internet businesses. At ONDC, he has been closely involved in shaping strategy and operations as the network seeks to move digital commerce away from platform-centric models towards an open network approach.
Before ONDC, Jain worked with JUMO, where he helped set up the fintech firm’s India operations, and led the India launch of Mobike, handling regulatory, policy and operational aspects of its market entry. Earlier, he co-founded Atlanta Healthcare, an air quality management company, and spent more than a decade in consulting roles at Andersen and EY, advising governments on public policy and technology-driven reforms, including work on the Aadhaar programme and tax systems.
The mandate is clear but the path is complex. As ONDC attempts to rewrite the rules of digital commerce, Jain now carries the burden of turning open architecture into mass adoption, in a market still dominated by platform power.
