The world’s largest retailers Wal-Mart is poised to enter the retail market in India following an agreement with India’s Bharti Enterprises. The two companies announced that they have entered into a deal to what they termed as - ‘jointly explore business opportunities’ in the country.

Sunil Mittal, Chairman of the Bharti group said that both the companies were looking forward to open several hundred stores across India under the world famous Wal-Mart brand name. UK retail giant Tesco wanted a similar venture with Bharti, but the talks ended unsuccessfully earlier this month.

In the rapidly growing Indian market, this joint venture with Bharti is a huge opportunity for the retail behemoth to gain a foothold. In India, it was necessary to find a local partner as retail companies like Tesco and Wal-Mart are not allowed to do retail level business and restricted to only wholesale level business.

Therefore, complying with government regulations, Wal-Mart will run the supply side of the business while Bharti will run the stores under the Wal-Mart brand name.

With Wal-Mart promising the lowest prices for their goods that is intended to target the huge Indian middle-class population, chances are that it will put many small Indian retailers out of business.

News via BBCNews.com