Amazon has asked India’s antitrust regulator to revoke its approval for Future Retail’s $3.4 billion sale of retail assets to Reliance, saying it was “illegally obtained”, violating an order suspending the deal, a letter seen by Reuters shows.
The approval for the deal was a “nullity in the eyes of law” as an arbitrator’s order was still in force, according to the letter sent by Amazon to the Competition Commission of India (CCI) last week.
The battle between two of the world’s richest men, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Reliance Industries boss Mukesh Ambani, marks a contest for preeminence in India’s booming, nearly trillion-dollar retail market.
The winner in the fight for Future Retail, India’s second-largest retailer and Amazon’s estranged local partner, will get pole position in the race to meet the daily needs of more than a billion people.
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