With the news of Flipkart Group’s fashion portal Jabong being completely merged into Myntra trickling in, the environment at the e-commerce giant’s Bengaluru office was tense and full of anxiety on Friday.

While Flipkart employees were not informed about a town hall, Myntra and Jabong Chief Executive Officer Ananth Narayanan, who is likely to step down from the role officially in coming days, addressed all the Jabong employees from the company’s Bengaluru office over video conference, sources in the company said.

Narayanan is learnt to have told the employees that all the roles at Jabong will be merged with that of Myntra, confirming the speculation that massive job losses are on the anvil at the e-fashion retailer. Jabong, which is currently headquartered at Gurgaon, will be relocating to Bengaluru.

Sources added, one-one-one discussions will also be held with each Jabong employee as the company gears up for its biggest transformation post US retail giant Walmart acquiring a 77 per cent stake in India’s largest e-commerce marketplace Flipkart in May this year with an investment of $16 billion.

“November has always been a month of big changes at Jabong, along with some unpleasant ones. But somehow, Jabong has always bounced back in a newer and stronger version. However, we are waiting to see what happens this time as it’s not going to be Jabong anymore,” said a former senior Jabong employee.

Reports say that around 200 job cuts are being speculated at Jabong as the roles are being merged with that of Myntra, which had acquired the former in 2016, to do away with duplication of roles.

“The catalogue operations team is about 50-100 people strong in Myntra but Walmart won’t need them anymore as the same catalogue shot can go anywhere. It will be the same with sourcing, logistics and tech teams as well. All of these can be merged,” said a source on the restructuring.

HR experts said following such a restructuring, people will not be out of job for long since other ecommerce companies are also hiring majorly and it is just an outcome of location change, skill requirement or the changing DNA of the organisation.

“This move is just an indication and outcome of any merger or acquisition happening in the industry, and the rationale is to get rid of the duplicity. This does not mean that exodus of ecommerce would start happening. However, there may be a rationalisation of manpower which will happen and since ecommerce companies are growing exponentially, a lot of inside opportunities must be available,” said Mayur Saraswat, Head of Digital, IT and Telecom Vertical, TeamLease Services.

Business Standard had reported on Wednesday that Narayanan is likely to step down as CEO of Myntra and Jabong after parent Flipkart rejigged its reporting structure, following the shocking exit of co-founder and Group CEO Binny Bansal on Tuesday. Reports also said that Myntra-Jabong’s CFO Dipanjan Roy too had stepped down though this could not be confirmed independently.