NEW DELHI: Online ecommerce giant Amazon has made a late bid for FreeCharge , the digital payments platform owned by troubled ecommerce marketplace Snapdeal , a development that comes at a time when the Gurgaon-based company is also in discussions to sell its payments unit to Axis Bank and telecom operator Bharti Airtel’s mobile wallet Airtel Money.According to two sources aware of the development, Amazon’s bid is in the range of $70-$80 million (Rs 466 crore- Rs 532 crore), with a term sheet signed by the Seattle-headquartered ecommerce behemoth and Jasper Infotech , which owns and operates both Snapdeal and Free-Charge, last week.The latest set of developments comes a little over two weeks after Axis Bank, the country’s third-largest private sector lender, emerged as one of the frontrunners to acquire FreeCharge for about $60-$65 million, as reported by ET in its edition dated July 8. Rival Paytm has also held talks to acquire Free-Charge, and has made a bid of $10 million, ET had reported.However, the sources cited above also said that not-withstanding Amazon’s late, but higher bid for FreeCharge, Axis Bank remained the favourite to acquire the digital payments platform that also competes with the likes of MobiKwik . When contacted by ET, An Amazon spokesperson said: “We don’t comment on rumours and speculations”.Separately, Jasper Infotech spokespersons did not respond to an ET questionnaire seeking clarity. A successful sale of FreeCharge will provide much-needed cash to the Snapdeal coffers, giving it critical runway of a few more months and allowing it to survive as a potentially standalone business.According to the sources, if successful in its endeavour to acquire FreeCharge, Amazon will most likely roll FreeCharge into its existing payments entity, Amazon Pay. This, however, could not be independently verified by ET. The online retail giant, which has committed to invest $5 billion in its local operations, recently pumped Rs 130 crore more into Amazon Pay India, as reported by Times of India earlier this month, citing regulatory filings submitted to the Registrar of Companies.Prior to that in April earlier this year, ET reported that Amazon India had been granted license by the Reserve Bank of India to operate a pre-paid payment instrument or wallet. The central bank issued the wallet licence in the name of Amazon Online Distribution Services, which also operates Amazon Pay that allows users to transact with offline partners of Amazon and online for Amazon’s marketplace services on Amazon.in and Amazon Now.FreeCharge was acquired by Jasper in 2015 in a cash-and-stock deal estimated at $400-450 million, in what was then the largest acquisition in the Indian startup space. However, the payments unit has been seeking a buyer for several months now, even as its parent negotiates the terms for its own sale. At one point, Jasper was eyeing a valuation of close to $1 billion for FreeCharge, as it tried to raise cash for unit, a process that began in late 2015.However, the reversal in the fortunes of Snapdeal had a drastic effect on FreeCharge, which saw the volume and value of transactions fall sharply. The company is estimated to have recorded Rs 300 crore in transaction revenue on about 12 million transactions in April.In its heyday, the payments company had forecast 7 million daily transactions and gross merchandise transactions of Rs 20,000 crore by the end of fiscal 2017.