Mumbai, Oct. 15: Online retailer Snapdeal is leaving no stone unturned in its efforts to take on rivals Flipkart and Amazon and grab a larger market share.

The e-tailer is understood to be on the verge of raising up to $650 million to strengthen its operations. This will be the second-largest funding in this sector after Flipkart’s $1-billion fund-raising exercise in July.

Snapdeal, too, has adopted the strategy to attract online shoppers with good discounts in the festival season. As part of its Diwali sale, it is offering discounts of up to 62 per cent on some products. This follows similar offers by both Flipkart and Amazon. Last week, Flipkart’s “Big Billion Day” sale had witnessed huge customer response but was marred by numerous complaints.

A spokesperson for Snapdeal declined to divulge details of the current cash plan. However, it is speculated that the money will be pumped in by existing investors that includes Japan’s SoftBank.

In May this year, Snapdeal had raised $100 million (Rs 600 crore) from Temasek, BlackRock Inc, Myriad, Premji Invest and Tybourne. Earlier, eBay led an investment of $133.7 million (Rs 830 crore) into Snapdeal. eBay is estimated to hold over 35 per cent in the company.

Snapdeal has raised about $400 million since its inception. The online marketplace houses over five million listed products across 500 categories from over 50,000 sellers.

Following the $1-billion investment by Flipkart, Amazon had announced a $2-billion investment in its Indian operations.

A report by consulting firm Technopak pegs the $2.3-billion etailing market to reach $32 billion by 2020.

Another report by PwC and Assocham suggests that e-commerce companies are expected to spend up to $1.9 billion by 2017-20 on infrastructure, logistics and warehousing.