US based ride hailing mobile application Uber has recently launched hyperlocal delivert services  from neighbourhood grocery and departmental stores. Through this drastic and strategic step Uber has entered into India's growing quick-delivery segment.

In India, this D2C grocery delivery and quick commerce service sector is primarily dominated by VC funded startups like Zepto, Swiggy Instamart, and Zomato-owned Blinkit. The company has launched this service in nine Indian cities including Delhi-NCR (National Capital Region), Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Chennai, Lucknow, Kolkata, Guwahati, and Ludhiana through two-wheelers and the customer orders are picked up from local stores.

Currently the company is mainly concerned with the delivery services, and the customers have to purchase and make the payment directly to the store. One of the company spokesperson said, gradually, they will start accepting payment from the customer on behalf of the stores.

Though the company did not disclose anything clearly about the service launch but they have added the "store pickup" option to the list of services it offers on its app. The launch of store pickup of Uber comes after the decline of Reliance Retail-backed Dunzo. Similarly, Walmart-backed PhonePe was also operating in quick commerce sector but later exited delivery of non-food categories.

Ecommerce giant Flipkart is also planning to enter the quick-commerce space. Companies such as Ola, Rapido and Porter offer on-demand pick up and drop services.

One of the officials of Uber mentioned, “Uber is starting with delivery of prepaid items from neighbourhood kirana shops, departmental stores, pharmacies, and several other use cases, but the product will be expanded where it would collect from and make the payments on behalf of the customer to the shop.”

Notably, Uber has been providing package pick-up and drop services in various cities in India via two-wheelers. According to as per The Wall Street Journal, the company has recorded a net loss of $654 million for the first quarter, mainly due to legal settlements. Analysts were expecting a profit of $474 million.

According to the industry experts, in the global scenario, Uber is expanding its grocery-delivery business that it operates under UberEats.