He believes Amazon’s long-term edge will come from its supply chain strength and its ability to carry deep assortment even in limited spaces — a quiet but significant differentiation that becomes more powerful with scale and time.
And like Gill on the pitch, Amazon knows when to attack and when to defend. “We’ll play defence and offence as and when needed, and it’ll remain the same boring stuff of focusing on core inputs that customers care about and continuing to innovate on that,” Kumar said.
The focus isn’t just on customer satisfaction, it extends to Amazon’s ecosystem, said Kumar. The company has invested Rs 300 crore in its fulfilment centres to ensure associates have access to clean drinking water, air-conditioning, washrooms and rest areas. “It’s not just Amazon employees, we’re doing this for any delivery partners too,” he added.
Amazon also continues to empower India’s small and medium businesses to sell globally, helping them plug into international markets and grow sustainably.
“In today’s fast-moving world,” Kumar said, “forget months and years, everything’s happening in days and weeks.” But amid the whirlwind pace, Kumar’s game remains rooted in these principles: focus on the customer, invest in infrastructure, and keep showing up innings after innings.
