New Delhi: Online food delivery platform Zomato on Friday announced it had acquired quick-commerce platform Blinkit for Rs 4,447 crore (about $568 million) in an all-stock deal. Zomato already owned more than 9% stake in Blinkit (earlier Grofers). While the earlier Blinkit deal value was around $700 million, the drop in Zomato’s share price reduced it to $568 million.
‘This foray into the next big category is timely as our existing food business is steadily growing towards profitability’, said Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal. ‘Zomato has grown at a CAGR of 86% in the last four years to an adjusted revenue of $710 million “while the adjusted EBITDA margin has improved from (153%) in FY19 to (18%) in FY22’, Goyal added.
Zomato’s restaurant supplies subsidiary Hyperpure will acquire the warehousing and ancillary services business of Hands on Trade Private Ltd (HOTPL) for Rs 60.7 crore. Akshant Goyal, Chief Financial Officer, Zomato said the company is ‘not acquiring the B2B trading business as that no longer fits strategically into our plans’. ‘Our existing Rs 2,228 million investment in HOTPL is protected through our liquidation preference right’, he said. The closing of the transaction is expected to happen in early August 2022.
Blinkit is a quick commerce marketplace delivering groceries and other essentials to customers within minutes (average delivery time of 15 minutes in the month of May). Blinkit was rebranded from Grofers after a pivot to quick commerce last year. Their erstwhile business model was next-day grocery delivery. ‘Blinkit’s business pivoted to 100% quick commerce in January 2022 and since then, the business has made tremendous progress on all important and relevant metrics for this business’, Goyal said.
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