Walmart to open two wholesale stores in Andhra, Punjab

Continuing with its measured expansion of wholesale stores in India, US retail giant Walmart plans to open two more outlets -- in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh and Ludhiana, Punjab.

"We recently received all internal approvals for opening two new cash-and-carry stores in India –- one in Vizag in Andhra Pradesh and second one in Ludhiana, our second store in the city in Punjab," Walmart India President and CEO Krish Iyer said in a statement.

A team is working towards procuring all relevant licenses and permits in order to launch the stores on time, he added.

The company, however, hasn't specified a date for opening the two new stores.

The upcoming store in Visakhapatnam will be the fourth Best Price Modern Wholesale store in Andhra Pradesh and Ludhiana will be Walmart India's sixth store in Punjab.

Best Price stores in Andhra Pradesh are based in Guntur, Rajahmundry and Vijaywada , while in Punjab, Best Prices are in Amritsar, Bhatinda, Jalandhar, Ludhiana and Zirakpur.

"In addition to our existing footprint of 20 cash-and-carry stores, we are on schedule to open the 21st store in Agra shortly this year as we remain steadfast on our plan to open 50 more cash-and-carry stores in the next four to five years," Iyer said.

He added the company has been been able to successfully launch its B2B e-commerce platform in 18 stores and are on track to extend it to the rest in next few months.

"We will continue to invest in supply chain infrastructure and supplier development, especially helping the growth of small and medium manufacturers in India," Iyer said.

In December, Walmart had announced it would open a new cash-and-carry store in Agra, after putting on hold expansions in India for two years as it underwent internal inquiries over alleged corruption practices and uncertainty over foreign direct investment (FDI) policy in the retail sector.

In 2013, the company had called off a six-year partnership with Bharti Enterprises and decided to operate stores independently in India.