Updated below with notes from an interaction with Hanif Sama, COO, Dhamaal.com Dhamaal.com, an ecommerce marketplace has been launched as a joint initiative by payment solutions provider Avenues and Infibeam's Buildabazaar.com, ecommerce store building website. If Flipkart can launch a payment gateway that competes with Avenues, why can't Avenues (which owns the payment gateway CC Avenues), launch a marketplace? Also worth noting that Dhamaal is to Avenues what Tradus is to its competitor PayU. The pitch that Dhamaal is making to merchants is that marketplaces tend to list their own products, and compete with their merchants; this is an obvious dig at the Amazon (global) and Flipkart+WS Retail approach. It is also positioning Dhamaal as a marketing platform, rather than a marketplace. Not a marketplace? Dhamaal.com does not have it own inventory, stocking, fulfillment or logistics, and inventory and logistics management are the merchant's responsibility. Dhamaal is being positioned by Avenues as a marketing platform instead of a marketplace: this is something one would expect it to say, since its payment gateway product CC Avenues is being used by merchants, and it would like to avoid an indication that it a group company is competing with clients. Avenues says that its intention is to provide marketing opportunities to merchants, but the platform offers direct sales through its website. SnapDeal also does not take a warehousing approach to its marketplace, and Dhamaal doesn't appear to be too different in that context. Tie-ups with Banks As a big catch, Dhamaal is also offering to…
