BGBS 2022: Flipkart launches modern fulfillment center in Haringhata

The announcement was made on the second and final day of the sixth edition of Bengal Global Business Summit.

The tech-enabled facility, which Flipkart claims will create more than 11,000 job opportunities and will support around 20,000 sellers from the state and North-East region, was inaugurated the BGBS 2022 by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in presence of Principal Chief Advisor to Chief Minister Amit Mitra, Industries Minister Partha Chatterjee, Minister of Transport and Housing Firhad Hakim, and Chief Secretary H.K. Dwivedi.

Inaugurating the center, the Chief Minister said, "It is a matter of immense pride that West Bengal will now house one of the largest fulfillment centers in the country as India’s e-commerce logistics industry takes a stride with the establishment of Flipkart’s state-of-the-art futuristic fulfillment center in Haringhata.

"I congratulate the entire team of Flipkart in achieving this feat which will significantly contribute to the economic development of the region and its citizens and also set new benchmarks in the industry for the development of sustainable and technology–enabled warehousing infrastructure in the country."

Located 50 kms from Kolkata, the Big box facility has an integrated supply chain management spread across 110 acres.

It will help strengthen the local economy with the availability of stronger supply chain infrastructure to connect thousands of sellers from West Bengal and the North East region with national market access while also catering to growing customer demand.

With 5 million cubic feet of storage spread across six mezzanine levels, the Haringhata fulfillment center will have a total built-up area of 2 million sq feet. The facility has been designed with state-of-the-art technologies such as automated storage and retrieval, robotic packaging arms, cross belt sorters, and a 9 km long network conveyor belt to reduce turnaround time by 35%-50% in shipments movement.

With system-driven task distribution, automation in storage, process and allocation, this FC has been designed for value creation for the ecosystem of customers and sellers.

Kalyan Krishnamurthy, Chief Executive Officer, Flipkart Group, said, "E-commerce has the power to truly connect every Indian while creating shared value for an ecosystem of sellers, customers,  artisans, kiranas and the farmer community.

"A strong supply chain is a backbone for connecting lakhs of small and large businesses, and as a homegrown e-commerce marketplace, we are committed to investing in infrastructure, technology and talent to unlock this opportunity for the country’s economic growth."

"The launch of the Haringhata fulfillment center will further strengthen supply chain infrastructure and is an important milestone in the creation of technology-led modern warehousing infrastructure in the country. We are proud that this is also one of our most sustainable facilities combining the strength of our operations to do good for our people and planet," he added.