Swiggy customers can pay through Sodexo meal cards

Rebel Foods, that own brands like Behrouz Biryani, Faasos, Oven Story Pizza, amongst others is planning to expand its to 120 cities within the next two years. 

At present, it operates over 450 cloud kitchens across India and globally, serving 75 cities in India alone. 

The company aims to double down on Tier 2 cities like Patna and Amritsar, where significant growth is being observed.

"We plan to intensify our focus in Tier 2 cities. With increasing mobile penetration and digital awareness, cities like Patna, Banaras, and Amritsar are showing strong growth. While Tier 1 cities continue to expand, we're seeing significant changes in food consumption habits that are driving impressive growth in Tier 2 markets as well,” said Ankush Grover, Co-founder and CEO, India and MENA (middle east and north America), Rebel Foods.

Rebel Foods, which hosts multiple brands like Faasos, Behrouz Biryani, Oven Story Pizza, Lunch Box, The Good Bowl, Sweet Tooth and Firangi Bake, plans to serve 550-600 catchments by 2025 through its omnichannel strategy. 

The startup recently raised $13.2 million in debt funding and is eyeing an IPO by 2025.

Launched in 2020, its EatSure app offers a foodcourt-on-an-app experience, allowing customers to order from multiple restaurants in a single go.
 

Swiggy, India’s pioneering on-demand convenience platform has announced the launch of Market Intelligence Dashboard, a powerful tool designed to provide restaurant partners with comprehensive and actionable insights into their performance vis à vis the market. 

This new dashboard aims to equip restaurants with the data they need to enhance their business strategies and operational efficiency.

The dashboard offers distinct insights to support various aspects of a restaurant’s operations:

1.    Overview Tab: Provides a holistic view of a restaurant's performance compared to the market, including key metrics like business, operations, customer, and spending. This tab offers an overall score and scores in each area, allowing partners to benchmark their performance. 

2.    Business Metrics Tab: Focuses on essential business indicators such as order growth and average order value. This tab benchmarks these metrics against industry best-in-class, helping restaurants identify areas for business growth and improvement.

3.    Operational Metrics Tab: Evaluates operational efficiency through metrics like order cancellations, availability, and customer complaints. By highlighting areas needing attention, this tab ensures that restaurants can maintain high standards of service consistently.

4.    Funnel Metrics Tab: Analyses customer behaviour and conversion rates, providing insights into how customers interact with the restaurant’s menu and services. This information is vital for optimizing menu offerings and improving overall customer satisfaction.

5.    Spend Metrics Tab: Tracks marketing investments on Swiggy, including ads and discounts. This tab allows restaurants to measure the effectiveness of their marketing effort, helping them to optimize their marketing spend.

“The Market Intelligence Dashboard is a powerful tool for our restaurant partners, helping them navigate a highly competitive food delivery industry. It effectively helps partners benchmark their performance versus the best in class, understand their areas of improvement or strength and make informed business decisions,” shared Deepak Maloo, AVP – Supply.

The Market Intelligence Dashboard is available to all of Swiggy’s restaurant partners, offering them the convenience of a self-serve format. This accessibility ensures that restaurants of all sizes can leverage the tool to enhance their competitive edge.

Gurgaon-based food delivery platform Zomato has increased its platform fee by 25% to Rs 5 per order. 

The platform fee is an extra charge on every order, separate from the delivery fee. Zomato started this fee in August 2023 at Rs 2 per order and then raised it to Rs 3 in October. Earlier this year, on January 1, they increased it to Rs 4 from Rs 3.

The company has also suspended its intercity delivery service, Intercity Legends.

These developments come on the heels of the company receiving tax demands and penalty orders from authorities. 

The Intercity Legends, was an initiative that used to deliver famous dishes from renowned restaurants across select cities in India. This service included biryani from Lucknow and Hyderabad and sweets from Kolkata and Bengaluru. 

Zomato transported these dishes by flight every day or two, depending on their perishability, keeping them frozen throughout the journey. 

But now, when you select the 'Legends' section on Zomato's app, the following message appears: "Enhancements are underway. Please stay tuned as we will be back to serve you soon." 

Meanwhile, Zomato has received a tax demand and penalty order amounting to Rs 11.82 crore related to GST on export services provided to its subsidiaries located outside India from July 2017 to March 2021.
 

Healthy food brand Salad Days has opened its first cloud kitchen in Mumbai’s Chandivali area, located in Andheri East. 

Following this, the brand is set to establish additional kitchens across Mumbai, targeting high-potential zones such as Andheri West, Lower Parel, and Khar. 

“The launch of our first cloud kitchen in Mumbai is a big milestone for Salad Days and sets the right tone for our growth plans for 2024. Mumbai, with its diverse and discerning audience, presents a thrilling opportunity for us to bring our various offerings to its residents and align with their food habits,” shared Varun Madan, Founder & CEO, Salad Days.

With plans to open four cloud kitchens in the first phase of Mumbai expansion, its goal is to acquire half a million customers in the city over the next two years. 

This step aligns with the brand’s larger growth strategy of marking its presence in three major geographies including Delhi-NCR, Bangalore, and Mumbai. 

Since its establishment in 2014, Salad Days has been at the forefront of transforming the culinary landscape of India, by championing a healthier lifestyle through its delectable and nutritious meals. The brand's vision is to make salads and other wholesome choices a regular part of Indian households' dining habits. Salad Days demonstrates its commitment to quality and sustainability through a network of 15 strategically located cloud kitchens in the Delhi-NCR and Bangalore regions. Additionally, the brand operates two central kitchens and an organic farm in Vasant Kunj (Delhi), cultivating a variety of fresh produce for its menu.

Salad Days boasts off an extensive and health-focused menu, featuring salads, grain bowls, baguette sandwiches, pita pockets, overnight oatmeal bowls, soups, cold-pressed juices, smoothies, and desserts. Also catering to diverse dietary preferences such as Keto-friendly, vegan, detoxifying, gluten-free, and lactose-free, the brand currently sells its offerings through home channels as well as India's leading food delivery aggregators, Swiggy and Zomato.

Rebel Foods, the world’s largest internet restaurant company, has joined the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), an initiative of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India. 

Customers can now order from 9 customer-first Rebel Foods brands through the Open Network. 

Through this pioneering move, Rebel Foods stands as the only world's largest internet restaurant company to have its brands integrated into the Network.

“Rebel Foods' presence on the ONDC Network represents another crucial touchpoint in our journey. We are leveraging cutting-edge technology for faster market access and increased flexibility. As the first cloud kitchen company of its magnitude to join the ONDC Network, it seamlessly aligns with our mission to establish an open, unbundled, and interoperable Open Network that fosters innovation, inclusion and accessibility,” shared T Koshy, MD & CEO, ONDC.

The cloud kitchen company will directly extend its own D2C platform EatSure to bring its multiple restaurant brands on the ONDC Network including Behrouz Biryani, Oven Story Pizza, Faasos, Sweet Truth, LunchBox, The Good Bowl, Firangi Bake, The Biryani Life and Wendy’s®. Through Open Network, Rebel Foods’ customer-loved brands aim to create multiple consumer touchpoints through disruptive innovations.

“Our collaboration with ONDC marks a pivotal moment, elevating our footprint and introducing EatSure’s trusted restaurants to a wide customer base. By being the only internet restaurant company at this scale to integrate on the ONDC seller app, we're innovating with new touchpoints to create extraordinary customer experiences. Rebel Foods going live on ONDC not only unlocks new business opportunities but reiterates our commitment to bringing our customer-loved brands across food missions in multiple geographies,” added Sagar Kochhar, Co-Founder, Rebel Foods.

India's tech stack is growing rapidly, and initiatives like the ONDC Protocol are playing a crucial role in driving innovation and growth for brands across the country. With ONDC, Rebel Foods brands will benefit from the network’s extensive accessibility.

The Hyderabad based Deliveroo India Development Centre announces the introduction of 'India Women in Tech' Group as a component of Deliveroo’s global Women in Tech Employee Resource Group (ERG) dedicated to enhancing gender diversity and empowering women in technical positions.

The primary objective of the Women in Tech ERG is to provide assistance and facilitate the progress and advancement of women occupying technical positions. 

This initiative strives to create broader prospects for women in technical roles within Deliveroo while fostering an inclusive and supportive work environment.

“Our mission is to improve gender diversity in technical roles not only within Deliveroo but also beyond our organization, while simultaneously supporting our women employees through mentoring and other means to aid their career advancement.” said Shubhi Shrivastava, Program Leader at IDC. 

The ‘India Women in Tech’ team consists of a group of enthusiastic and passionate women based at the India Development Centre (IDC). 

Currently comprising 26 members, the team aims to be proportionally represented in various spheres and make significant contributions to Deliveroo’s global Women in Tech ERG. 

In 2023, the 'Women in Tech' team in India aims to enhance gender diversity and engagement by increasing the hiring of women in technical roles. They will leverage Deliveroo's global engagement programs and ERG initiatives to provide valuable opportunities for Indian team members. The team will strategically plan global events, networking activities, mentorship programmes, and invite distinguished women speakers to share their experiences of career-family balance, overcoming gender bias, and engaging in technical discussions. These initiatives will empower team members for professional growth and advancement.

Kolkata-based cloud-kitchen brand edabba has partnered with Saffola Oats to curate a menu of traditional dishes made with oats.

The OatSoGood menu made with Saffola Oats is listed on Edabba’s Zomato and Swiggy accounts, where in foodies can easily place their orders and relish the delicious Saffola Oats dishes at home.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Saffola Oats, a pioneer in the healthy food segment. The eating habits of consumers are changing; they expect their nutritional needs to be met in every fresh meal even if they have access to home cooked meals. With this collaboration we seek to foster a balance between healthy and delicious food which our customers can have guilt free,” shared Vedant Pasari Founder – Edabba.

Saffola Oats, made from 100% natural rolled oats, has soft grains that blend seamlessly into almost every recipe, sprucing up your regular dishes and giving you a wholesome meal.

The menu is a curation of 5 handpicked recipes from the Northern and Eastern parts of India, while staying true to the unique style of edabba’s dishes.

Regarding the collaboration, a Marico Limited spokesperson added, “At Saffola Oats we are constantly trying new and innovative ways to help consumers include oats as part of their diet. Our Collaboration with Edabba to curate this unique menu that will offer customers their favorite traditional dishes with a twist of oats.”

Edabba is now one of the top local cloud kitchen enterprises in East India, with 8 kitchens and having served over 7 Lakhs orders in Kolkata and Bangalore. The company also owns other cloud kitchen brands such as ebowl, Kolkata Local and Red Lantern under its umbrella. 

Bengaluru-based online food delivery platform Swiggy is anticipated to let go of up to 10% of its workforce, or roughly 600 individuals, following a thorough performance evaluation that was completed late last year amid economic uncertainty and concerns.

Swiggy's impending layoffs will probably have an effect on the company's product, engineering, and operation divisions.

In order to decrease cash burn, Swiggy's quick commerce delivery service Instamart is also anticipated to be impacted by the impending layoffs.

According to earlier reports that appeared in December, Swiggy may begin firing more than 250 workers in January, or up to 5% of its staff.

However, after the performance cycle's conclusion in October, the number of laid-off workers would increase even further. The business has just about 6,000 employees.

Swiggy previously stated there were no layoffs and that "we expect exits based on performance" with each performance cycle.

Losses at the online meal delivery service more than doubled to Rs 3,629 crore in FY22 from Rs 1,617 crore the previous fiscal year.

In FY22, total expenses increased 13% to Rs 9,574.5 crore, according to the company's annual financial statement filed with the Registrar of Companies (RoC).

Swiggy's revenue increased by 2.2 times in FY22, from Rs 2,547 crore to Rs 5,705 crore. Despite giving significant savings, global brokerage firm Jefferies said in November of last year that Swiggy was rapidly losing market share to its competitor Zomato.

The food delivery service raised $700 million earlier in 2022 under the leadership of Invesco at a $10.7 billion value.

In an attempt to build deeper connections with users across Delhi and Punjab, Swiggy, one of the leading on-demand convenience platform, has collaborated with popular singer and actor- Ammy Virk for a series of TVCs.

The humorous TVCs showcase local delicacies across the two states, which are now easily accessible at the tap of a button on Swiggy.

“We are delighted to partner with Ammy Virk, one of the most loved artists in the North. The love for food in this region has always been well known. With a growing population of young, internet and convenience-savvy users, the demand for our services in the region has been heartening. With this partnership and through the fun stories this campaign highlights, we hope to inspire more users to make their meals more interesting with the wide range of food and restaurants available on Swiggy,” shared Ashish Lingamneni, Head of Brand at Swiggy.

The organically shot commercials highlight the unique, sassy, and charming relationship between Ammy and his bodyguards. Though a foodie who is keen on eating all the scrumptious delicacies available in Delhi and Punjab, it is not always convenient for him to step out and travel long distances to enjoy a meal, unlike his bodyguards.

In the film, we see Ammy’s bodyguards tease him with their local food escapades. But without taking it too far, they introduce him to the expansive range of dishes and restaurants on Swiggy, which changes the game completely.

Swiggy has a great presence in Delhi and Punjab, with lakhs of dishes and thousands of restaurants, available at a click. Through these ad films, Swiggy is leveraging people’s passionate love for food and talk to them about the convenience of ordering through the platform.

“To showcase how we have all the dishes and restaurants you can think of to eat in Delhi and Punjab, we chose to tell this story with someone who never has a choice to go an eat out as freely as us. A celebrity. More precisely, a celebrity of the stature of Ammy Virk. We crafted a campaign that flaunts the tongue-in-cheek relationship of Ammy Virk with his bodyguards,” added Sukesh Nayak, Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy India.

The campaign will be rolled out in Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Jammu across multiple touch points like TV, Print, OOH and digital.

In a recent order passed, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India has directed food aggregators Swiggy and Zomato have to list the nutritional values and allergens of all food items to be sold from their platforms.

Starting July 1, FSSAI has also asked these aggregators to ensure that their business partners that run over 10 food outlets and have annual revenue of more than INR 20 Cr have applied for a central (food) license.

Further the guidelines asked food aggregators to do the menu labeling for the food they sell online. Besides, they will also have to direct food establishments (restaurant operators) to show nutritional value such as calorie intake and allergen information on the food items that are listed on their platforms.

“The aim is to inform people about what kind of food they are ordering online and the kind of nutritional and allergen content (present in the food),” added Arun Singhal, CEO, FSSAI.

At present, packaged food have labels that display nutritional information of the items. On the other hand, cooked food does not have such information. By enabling menu labeling on cooked food items, consumers will be able to make healthier choices, it added.

To enable menu labeling, FSSAI has ordered Swiggy and Zomato to upgrade their platforms so that food business operators can add information regarding the nutritional value of food that they sell.

FSSAI has also asked all regional directors to ensure that ecommerce food business aggregators (foodtech giants and food delivery platforms) are complying with the new regulations. In case, any ecommerce food business aggregators failing to adhere to the new norms, then an improvement notice will be issued to them. Despite this, if they fail to comply then their license will be cancelled.

Food brand aggregator Big Band Food Tech (BBFT) has raised ₹4.8 crores in seed funding led by Artha Venture Fund, India's first early-stage micro-VC fund.

Angel investors such as Harsh Jain, Ashneer Grover, Chitra Radhakrishnan, Lakshmi Alagappan, Anand Kumar, and Nikhil Aggarwal also participated in the round.

“We are excited with our pace of growth and have observed massive whitespace in the F&B segment that we plan to conquer. As Urban Indian’s annual spend on outside food goes from < 100$ to China and Brasil’s >600$, there will be multiple breakout Indian brands,” said Abhimanyu Singh Rana, Co-founder, Big Bang Food Tech.

The Thrasio-style restaurant rollup startup will acquire more brands and expand its base with 90+ outlets.

Besides, the 4-person founding team will deploy part of this round to upgrade its supply chain technology and grow the team. Big Bang Food Tech is AVF's 17^th investment from its ₹225 crores micro-VC fund.

It has also acquired the legacy brand 34 Chowringhee Lane, which operates 37 outlets, with this funding round.

The brand’s monthly orders have grown by 50% since December 2021.

Based on the e-commerce rollup model, the ‘house of food brands’ will acquire 8 more legacy brands by FY 2022-23, with a targeted cumulative revenue of ₹120 Cr generating 100+ direct and indirect jobs across the country.

“I believe that we have backed the four founders best suited to create a restaurant rollup giant. The founders are food connoisseurs with a solid tech background bringing in a cumulative experience of over a century which is a rare combination for such a startup,” added Anirudh A Damani, Managing Partner, Artha Venture Fund.

BBFT leadership team comprises the who’s who of the F&B industry. While ISB grad Sonia Sinha is a two-time founder (Tupples and Sequoia-backed DoubtNut), Manu Mohindra, with his 30+ years of experience, can be credited for reimagining Wendy’s product offering for their entry into India, as well as redeveloping Barista post its last acquisition, enabling it to grow 50% since. Additionally, Sonia Mohindra had played an instrumental role in opening 50 outlets of the Republic of Chicken from scratch within 60 days, and IITD grad Abhimanyu built and scaled multiple award-winning F&B brands.

Delivery Hero expects its food delivery business to break even during H2 2022 and shares insights on Glovo’s business performance

One of the world’s leading delivery platform Delivery Hero has announced that its food delivery business (including Glovo) is expected to break even during H2 2022.

Operating its service in around 50 countries across Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa it can also generate between EUR 0 and 100 million in adjusted EBITDA in Q4 2022, while investments related to its quick commerce business are predicted to peak in the first quarter of 2022 and gradually decline thereafter. Delivery Hero reconfirms its long-term adjusted EBITDA/GMV margin target of 5-8%.

“Delivery Hero has always been investing into growth with the clear ambition of reaching the scale needed to achieve profitability. We have remained confident that through achieving the right size, we are able to bring tremendous benefits to all partners in our ecosystem, as well as to our shareholders,” said Emmanuel Thomassin, CFO of Delivery Hero by adding that the investment strategy has proved to be successful, and the brand is on a solid trajectory to turn their food delivery business profitable during the second half of this year.

It also announced that it has sold USD 150 million worth of its stake in the Latin-American delivery company Rappi in a series of transactions.

Delivery Hero continues to hold an approximate stake of 7.9% in Rappi on a fully diluted basis, currently valued at over USD 400 million based on the Series F valuation.

It first invested in Rappi in its Series B, when the company was valued at approximately USD 400 million. Rappi’s financial performance is a testament to the company’s overall fantastic growth and strong business model. However, Delivery Hero will continue to exercise a disciplined capital allocation, and focus on investments that are in line with the Group’s strategic vision. Over time, the remaining Rappi shares will be monetized at an appropriate valuation.

Online food ordering and delivery platform Uber Eats on Tuesday shared in an online statement that it is quitting Hong Kong market by the end of 2021.

Launched in 2014 by Uber, it entered Hong Kong market five years ago to catch the fastest growing demand for online food ordering and delivery.

“After five years of partnering with restaurants and delivery people in Hong Kong, we have made the difficult decision to discontinue Uber Eats in Hong Kong on 31 December 2021,” shared the statement by adding that their priority now is to support their employees, restaurant partners, delivery people and consumers in the transition. “We couldn’t have built what we did without their trust and hard work, and we thank them for their support for the platform,” it added as the company do not mentioned any particular reason for its exit.

According to data platform Measurable AI, Uber Eats managed only five percent market share compared with Deliveroo’s 44 percent and Foodpanda’s 51 percent.

“Whilst we wind down our delivery platform operations in Hong Kong, we are more committed than ever to growing our mobility platform in the city, which is home to our largest Uber Taxi business globally. We will keep investing and serve more riders and drivers in coming years by bringing the very best technology to Hong Kong,” it concluded.

Food-tech platform Swiggy has announced that it will allow employees to cash in stock options worth $35-40 million over the next two years in July 2022 and 2023.

The programme is pegged at $35-40 million at Swiggy’s $5.5 billion valuation following its $1.25 billion funding round in July, shared reports.

All employees with stock options will be eligible to participate. The value of the stock options will increase in tandem with the company’s valuation.

“As Swiggy grows, we want our team to grow with us and enjoy the fruits of their hard work and valuable contributions. This is an industry-first initiative whereby we are democratising wealth creation by enabling all employees with stock options to participate in liquidity events,” shared Girish Menon, head of human resources, Swiggy by adding that more importantly, by giving them visibility on the liquidity programme, they are giving them the flexibility to plan their cash flow and investments.

Swiggy had conducted its first share buyback in June 2018. Its second, in November 2020, was commissioned via a secondary sale. The value of that buyback was estimated to be in the range of $7-9 million.

The Bengaluru based food delivery platform also mentioned that its food delivery business had surpassed pre-Covid levels and non-food businesses were witnessing robust growth.

“Swiggy and its board have decided to institute a one-of-its-kind programme to enable consistent wealth creation for employees through two distinct liquidity events in the next two years,” added the statement.

Bengaluru-based Swiggy on Thursday announced to prioritise Genie deliveries the company's pick up and drop service as the country is witnessing increasing Covid-19 cases in the second wave of coronavirus.

All Genie orders will have dedicated customer care support. The prioritisation of Swiggy Genie orders will be of immense help for those recovering at home or taking care of someone with medical necessities, grocery needs or home cooked meals, the company said in a statement.

"We are overwhelmed with messages from consumers expressing how Swiggy Genie has been a lifeline in these tough times. With several cities under lockdown, and family or friends to take care of, Swiggy Genie has delivered necessities like home-cooked meals, OTC medicines, test reports and grocery to the doorsteps of Indians," shared Vivek Sunder, COO, Swiggy.

Swiggy is also directly working with hundreds of Covid Heroes who are providing meals to affected families and will prioritise these deliveries as well.

The platform witnessed a 350 per cent increase in the delivery of OTC medicines through Swiggy Genie, present in 65 cities across the country, in the last 15 days compared to the same period last month.

"Considering the criticality of the service, we are now prioritising Genie deliveries. We urge users to stay indoors and we will do our best to get them whatever they need while also keeping the safety of our partners top of mind," added Sunder.

Almost half a million home cooked meals and tiffins have been ferried to friends and family in the same period. Covid Heroes, who are selflessly cooking meals to help those in need have been using the service to help those in need.

Swiggy and Zomato are working with minimal delivery partners and limited restaurant partners in several states as delivery executives are refusing to step out fearing police harassment amidst the lockdown.

Not just this, kitchens have also started facing issues with procuring supplies to run operations, thereby pressuring them to shut shop. Orders on food delivery platforms are down by at least 60% across cities.

“There has been a short-term impact in terms of softening in volumes which can be attributed to the shortage of supply due to temporary closure of many highvolume restaurants located in malls and disruptions on-ground across certain states,” a Swiggy spokesperson said on Tuesday evening.

Despite being classified as an “essential service”, Zomato said it has been operating at 30% delivery capacity because it has been facing issues across the cities due to lockdown. The delivery executives are facing challenges from the local authorities and policemen who do not see them as “essentials”

Over the last few days, several pockets of Mumbai, Gurgaon and Ahmedabad saw food deliveries drop to zero with restrictions on movement of people as well as the closure of most restaurants due to the nation wide lockdown.
 

In the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic throughout the world, Zomato said that it will extend the paid Gold memberships by two months at zero additional cost.

This was confirmed in a series of tweet by the CEO and founder of Zomato, which said, "All paid Zomato Gold memberships across India, UAE, Australia, Indonesia, Philippines, Lebanon, Turkey, New Zealand, Portugal and Qatar will get a two month membership extension at zero cost. In later tweets he also added that the company is actively working with the authorities to clear the confusion so that essential services can operate without trouble.

What Zomato is offering to its Gold restaurant partners -

Zomato is looking to provide its Gold restaurant partners with working capital loans. Since dining out in many countries is badly hit, Gold partners (dining out), will be facilitated with working capital loans to get through this tough time. For any help, [email protected] has been made open as per T&C that Zomato is still figuring out.

Right now, Zomato can only help facilitate loans to Gold partner restaurants since the transactions flow through the company, and it is easier and cheaper for its fintech partners to underwrite it. "Trying to figure out how to help the rest of the restaurant community."

Further, Zomato is also going to facilitate loans for our food delivery restaurant partners. Thousands of restaurants have been severely hit because of their immobilised workforce due to the nation-wide lockdown.

Zomato also said, hundreds of its employees have voluntary taken salary cuts. It is also donating for the delivery partner fund and Feed the Daily Wager campaign to support the community during these times," tweeted Goyal.

Pizza chains are hiring as the Coronavirus pandemic convinces customers to order delivery. Pizza Hut announced on Monday that it is hiring for more than 30,000 open positions across the US. Papa John's announced on the same day it is planning to hire up to 20,000 additional workers. And, Domino's announced on Friday that it is also hiring.

While restaurant traffic goes down due to self isolation, ironically pizza chains - especially those with an emphasis on delivery could be a rare sector that sees more business during the pandemic. On one hand when people are advised to stay in, this move of hiring more delivery executives is nothing but an irony to staying in. 

Safety remains a concern for workers

These hiring might be a step to resolve the unemployment issue, but some workers at these pizza chains are still worried about their safety. Their concern primarily rises from the fact that they might get themselves exposed with Coronavirus pandemic during food delivery.

A pizza hut delivery driver said, "It feels like I'm being exposed to the 10 to 20 co-workers plus everyone every driver delivers to that shift, resulting in direct and indirect exposure to hundreds of people a day. Unfortunately I'm not able to stop going to work unless Domino's lays me off so I can draw unemployment. I'm currently looking for work-at-home opportunities but I'm afraid I won't be able to make the transition before becoming infected. I haven't seen my son or family in a week out of fear of infecting them unknowingly.”

Pizza Hut said in a statement. "We've implemented contactless delivery and carryout procedures to ensure a hands-free experience built around social distancing," the statement continued. "Once the pizza leaves our 400+ degree oven, it slides hands-free into the box and straight to your home. Additionally, we've doubled down on industry-leading sanitization and handwashing procedures." Coronavirus scare expected to impact experiential industry hard, Q2 & Q3 might register dismal growth  delivery, which is available at the customer's request, as well as announcing updated cleanliness and sanitation policies.

Even though there are stringent safety measures taken by these chains yet at this point of time its important that every body stays in including the delivery executives. 

Bengaluru-based HungerBox, a B2B food tech solutions provider has launched initiatives to make sure the company is compliant with the directives around social distancing in the cafeteria that it operates at client locations, in the wake of Coronavirus outbreak.

The Desk-Ordering Feature -

According to this feature consumers will view a concise menu on their phone and select their choice of food. They also have an option to indicate their floor and cubicle number and have food executives from the company cafeteria will deliver food at their desk. Not just this, the company is also setting up food dispensing machines wherein employees will have access to a range of ready-to-eat food from partners like MTR, Daawat, and few others. As per that, the food is pre-loaded in food dispensers to ensure food safety and lessened chances of contamination, the company said.

"Over the last few days, we have enabled these features across more than one hundred cafeteria’s," said Sandipan Mitra, Co-founder and CEO of Hungerbox. The company recently raised $12 million in a new round of funding from a different investors including Paytm, Sabre Partners, Neoplux, and NPTK Emerging Asia Fund. Hungerbox serves averagely over 5.5 lakh orders per day. Other players leveraging the ‘contactless service’

Food giant like Domino's Pizza and McDonald's had also recently contactless delivery of the food items to their patrons, due to the rising pandemic. Not just this, online food delivery players like Swiggy and Zomato has also been taking continuous measures for safe food handling during the outbreak situation. Recently they said they are regularly sanitizing their food delivery partners, offering the delivery executives work from home services to combat the disease.

Uber Eats, the latest aggregator said it would waive delivery fee for independent restaurants across the United States and Canada. This is the latest move by the company in the wake of the Coronavirus outbreak.
Not just this, Uber Eats is also launching daily marketing campaigns to promote delivery from local restaurants, especially those that are new to the app. It aims to allow restaurants of all sizes to opt into daily payments on all Uber Eats orders, rather than weekly billing. Additionally it has committed 300,000 free meals on Uber Eats to first responders and healthcare workers in the US and Canada.

Europe's largest online food ordering and delivery service Takeaway.com said that it had seen a surge in restaurants signing up on its platform in the Netherlands in the wake of a government-ordered restaurant closure.
Due to an expected drop in diners as states and cities postpone major events and crack down on dining establishments and other gathering places themselves, this is a much needed financial relief.

Other eatery chains that has waived off delivery fee -
GrubHub on Friday said it expected dine-in traffic in U.S. eateries to reduce by 75% over the next few weeks. Also, some food chains including Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc and Fried chicken chain KFC, owned by Yum! Brands are offering free delivery to offset in-store declines.

Uber has also announced to offer two weeks of pay to drivers and delivery people who test positive for COVID-19 and those who are forced to quarantine. Additionally the company is offering with sanitization products to help limit the spread of the virus. It is indeed noteworthy to watch these food outlets taking diligent steps each day to help combat the virus.

With the outbreak of Coronavirus, online food delivery company Swiggy, is among the latest of the startups that have mandated work-from-home for their employees. This is indeed a huge step taken to help combat the outbreak of Coronavirus.

We need not emphasis on the importance of healthy and safe food specially during this crisis period. In such a scenario, steps taken by Swiggy and other start-ups as well as giants is definitely going to contribute in the outbreak of the disease.

Several other startups like online brokerage Zerodha, education technology platform Unacademy, social commerce platform Meesho and bike rental company Bounce had announced mandatory work-from-home policy for their employees on Thursday. Not only these, giant companies like Flipkart and Zomato are also in the race to combat the outbreak of Coronavirus by updating its leave policies.

The development comes at a time when the Karnataka government has announced shutting down of malls, cinema halls, pubs, schools, colleges and all other mass gathering events across the state for a week, starting from Saturday. In another development, a Google employee in Bengaluru tested positive for Covid-19 on Thursday.

Other companies that have mandated work from home are, Dailyhunt, fintech startup KhataBook. This is indeed a good move that is being taken by these company in the current health scenario. Ever since the outbreak of Coronavirus, food delivery platforms, giant outlets like McDonald’s and Starbucks are taking continuous precaution to help combat the disease.

Swiggy has hiked the prices of its membership program called “Swiggy Super”.

The food delivery platform has raised the monthly subscription service charges for existing super members, which earlier cost Rs 79, to Rs 149. Similarly, the 3-month Swiggy Super membership plan, which was priced at Rs 179 earlier, will now be available for a price of 349.

The company’s upgraded membership plans will be effective starting from 08/01/2019. These upgraded prices will be applicable to the existing Swiggy Super members upon renewal.

For the first-time members/newbies, Swiggy is offering Swiggy Super Membership for Rs 79 for 1 month and Rs 179 for three months.

Swiggy Super Membership Programme

Swiggy’s membership program was rolled out back in July to provide unlimited free deliveries to its subscribers across all restaurants. Swiggy Super was priced at Rs 79 for one month and Rs 149 for three months.

The benefit of the membership includes that the members are not levied any surge fee during peak hours. Swiggy Super Membership Programme was introduced to take on the likes of its competitors such as Zomato and Uber Eats. Zomato’s Gold membership provides benefits like 1+1 in food and 2+2 in drinks on partner restaurants. 

Besides availing unlimited free deliveries on orders above Rs 99, the Swiggy Super members are offered priority customer services.

The food-delivery app firm promised to offer unlimited free deliveries across 35000 restaurants, listed on its platform irrespective of the distance or time of the day.

Why is food delivery trending?

In India, food trends are continuously changing with the change in eating habits of the ever-demanding consumers and the new concepts heating up the million-dollar food service industry.

From going to a restaurant over dinner or lunch, people today look out for delivery and getting their favourite food delivered to their doorstep. Similarly, rather than going to the grocery store to buy raw materials first and then cook them, customers can push a button and have their meal delivered in around 30 minutes from some of their favourite restaurants.

Seeking this opportunity not only the aggregators or delivery players who started this trend is betting big on this model but restaurants and food players are also eyeing this as the next ground to invest in.

Pros of food delivery

Placing orders online or on such apps proved beneficial for everyone. There are special discounts for new customers or discounts at various restaurants, always going on. A restaurant finder app can easily help you avail such discounts.

Brands and outlets have also started tying up with food delivery and hyperlocal mobile as getting listed on third-party Aggregators has proven very fruitful for them.

Foodpanda, an online food delivery platform, has reported a 230% rise in its losses to Rs 756 crore in fiscal year 2019. In FY2017-18, Foodpanda, owned by ride-hailing major Ola, had registered loss of Rs 227.95 crore.

However, the company’s revenue from operations and other income rose 12.2% to Rs 81.77 crore in FY19 as compared to Rs 72.84 crore in the preceding fiscal.

Foodpanda said, “The online food ordering market is a multi-billion industry and provides ample opportunity of growth. We being an early player in the online food ordering and processing market have a deep understanding of the market dynamics and the revenue and profitability levers,”

Foodpanda’s management is revamping the entire process in order to focus on becoming leaders in food manufacturing and processing.

“To achieve this, we have built state-of-the-art kitchen infrastructure and launched various brands in different segments like shakes, khichdi, biryani, rice bowls and desserts. Our focus this year would be on further improving the customer experience and increasing our market share through a diverse and comprehensive product portfolio,” the company further stated.

Anchal Agarwal, CEO of Tofler, said that Foodpanda's burn rate of Rs 756 crore over Rs 82 crore of revenues is one of the highest among Indian startups.

“The significant increase in expenses from the last year is contributed by discounts provided and delivery charges incurred. It is interesting to note that the company has incurred delivery charges of Rs 267 crore compared to its revenues of Rs 82 crore. The discount expenses were to the tune of Rs 137 crore (that's nearly 1.5x of revenues),” she stated.

Agarwal further added, “Foodpanda's decision to build cloud kitchen brands makes sense in light of the surging expenses the company seems to have incurred in the previous year. They have also infused $100 million in the form of debt in the company.”

Food delivery Pros

Placing orders online proves beneficial to everyone. There are special discounts for new customers or discounts at various restaurants, always going on. A restaurant finder app can easily help you avail of such discounts. Brands and outlets have begun tying up with food delivery and hyperlocal mobile as getting listed on third-party Aggregators has proven very fruitful for them.

Food delivery Cons

There can also be a few obstacles that come in the way of food deliveries. Such startups need tremendous efficiency in order to overcome real-world challenges, meet customer expectations and turn profitable, all the while competing with the in-house delivery expenses of restaurants, which is not very large. Also, many restaurants still seem hesitant to get into this market due to their own valid reasons.

Swiggy, an online food delivery service, has partnered with scooter-sharing startup Bounce to launch a bike taxi pilot in Indore and Ahmedabad.

Under this partnership, Swiggy’s delivery personnel uses Bounce’s ride-hailing service to pick up and drop customers when food delivery orders are low. While bikes and personnel are Swiggy’s, Bounce acts as a platform where they can find customers. The pilot of the service is said to be running for the past two months.

The reasons for choosing Indore and Ahmedabad for the pilot are reported to be the fact that these two are not high-density markets for Swiggy and the scope for experimenting is much higher. Additionally, the small size of the markets and the low chances of regulatory hurdles are said to be other reasons for selecting these locations.

A source said, “While this is just a pilot, the larger plan for Swiggy is to launch bike taxis in one of its major markets, which is said to be at least six months away. Bengaluru and Gurugram (Gurgaon) are being discussed as options.” 

Bounce was founded as Wicked Rides by Vivekananda HR, Varun Agni and Anil G in 2014. The company provides premium motorcycles for rent under the Wicked Rides banner, and commuter bikes under the Bounce brand.

Zomato, food delivery and restaurant discovery company, is in advance talks to acquire Dunzo Digital Pvt Ltd, the Bengaluru-based on-demand services provider.

The acquisition of Dunzo will help Zomato to gain an edge in expanding its delivery services from food to other products.

The development comes after Zomato’s rival Swiggy has launched a new hyperlocal service that would deliver grocery and other essential products. With this launch, Swiggy has expanded its services from food to on-demand product delivery. 

Launched in 2015, Dunzo counts tech giant Google and Blume Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm, among its investors. The company was founded by Kabeer Biswas, Mukund Jha, Ankur Aggarwal and Dalvir Suri. It delivers products from local stores and has also been running bike taxi services in Gurugram.

Restaurant discovery and reservation site Zomato has announced the launch of a first-of-its-kind, 30,000 sq ft Hyperpure warehouse in Bengaluru.

This move will enable Zomato to offer a wide range of fresh and high-quality food products to over 2500+ restaurants every day.

“A single thread unites the entire chain of Zomato lines of businesses -- better food for more people. Everything we do to bring together restaurants, consumers, food suppliers and logistics partners, working towards ensuring more people have access to fresh and clean food,” shared Deepinder Goyal, Founder and CEO, Zomato that is driving transparency and accountability across the food supply value chain since August 2018.

Hyperpure by Zomato supplies restaurants with fresh, and clean ingredients, at competitive prices. Through a technology-driven platform, restaurants can buy everything from vegetables & fruits, poultry (including antibiotic residue-free chicken), groceries, meats, seafood, and dairy; to beverages, and even eco-friendly packaging.

Commenting on the progress, Dhruv Sawhney, Founder, Hyperpure, said, “To address the growing demand, we have moved to a 30,000 sq ft warehouse in Bengaluru and will soon launch an even larger warehouse in Delhi. We will open Hyperpure warehouses in nine more cities across India by the end of this year, and eventually, across our international markets.” 

The move from a 6,000 sq ft warehouse (able to supply 200-250 metric tons a month) to a 30,000 sq ft space built to supply 4,000 metric ton capacity per month, will enable the company to service over 2500+ restaurants every day. It will use an end-to-end technology-driven platform, custom-built for this leg of the food value chain.

Hyperpure works directly with a large network — farmers, mills, producers, and processors — and carefully builds and monitors relationships with the source of each of our products. This enables Zomato to be able to provide the freshest, most high-quality-produce while continuing to build affordability, accessibility and convenience around food.

The platform is also a great place for big brands to launch new products and serves as a one-stop solution to discover what variety of products exist in the market.  Zomato helps restaurants that buy from Hyperpure spread more awareness about the good choices that they are making by showcasing the ‘HYPERPURE INSIDE’ tag on the restaurants’ pages. This way, consumers can trust that when they dine-out or order-in, their food is made with fresh, high-quality ingredients sourced directly from local farmers.

Restaurateurs can onboard themselves on the Hyperpure platform by downloading the app or logging on to hyperpure.com, and start buying fresh produce within 48 hours.

फूड डिलीवरी ऐप जोमैटो, ने अमेरिका स्थित ग्लेड ब्रूक कैपिटल से नए फंडिंग राउंड में 284.42 करोड़ जुटाए हैं।

गुड़गांव स्थित कंपनी द्वारा फंड डालने के लिए ग्लेड ब्रूक को 1300 वर्ग श्रेणी प्राथमिकता शेयर मिले हैं। ये निवेश जोमैटो की सीरीज-I वित्तीय राउंड का हिस्सा है।

अब तक, जोमैटो फंडिंग में करीब 600 मिलियन डॉलर जुटा चुका है। इसने आंट वित्तीय, चीन के अलीबाबा ग्रुप होल्डिंग की सहयोगी, से अक्टूबर में 210 मिलियन डॉलर जुटाए हैं।

जोमैटो फ्रेश फंडिग में एक बिलियन डॉलर जुटाने के लिए चीनी निजी इक्विटी प्लेयर प्रिमावेरा कैपिटल से बातचीत कर रहा है। पिछले साल, फूड डिलीवरी फर्म ने फंडिंग के दो राउंड में आंट वित्तीय से 410 मिलियन डॉलर जुटाए हैं।

ग्लेड ब्रूक कैपिटल विश्व की टेक्नोलॉजी कंपनियों को विकास पूंजी प्रदान करता है। कंपनी ने पहले अलीबाबा ग्रुप, उबर, एयरबीएनबी, स्नैप और वीवर्क में निवेश किया है।

उद्योग विश्लेष्कों के अनुसार, ऑनलाइन फूड डिलीवरी मार्केट एक महीने में औसतन 40 मिलियन से ज्यादा ऑर्डर ले रहा है।

Zomato, food delivery and restaurant discovery platform, has raised Rs 284.42 crore in fresh funding round from US-based Glade Brook Capital.

Glade Brook received 13,000 class 1 preference shares for the fund infusion by the Gurgaon-based company. The investment is part of Zomato’s series-I financing round.

So far, Zomato has raised around $600 million in funding. It had raised $210 million in October 2018 from Ant Financial, an affiliate of China’s Alibaba Group Holding.

Zomato is also in talks with Chinese private equity player Primavera Capital to raise up to $1 billion in fresh funding. Last year, the food delivery firm had raised $410 million from Ant Financial across two rounds of funding.

Glade Brook Capital offers growth capital to technology companies worldwide. The company has earlier invested in the Alibaba Group, Uber, Airbnb, Snap and WeWork.

According to industry analysts, the online food delivery market is clocking more than 40 million orders a month on an average.

Swiggy, an online food delivery platform, has acquihired a Bengaluru-based artificial intelligence (AI) startup, Kint.io, which applies deep learning and computer vision for identifying objects in videos.

In 2018, Swiggy had appointed Dale Vaz as Head Engineering and Data Sciences to build the AI-driven platform for hyperlocal discovery and on-demand delivery.

Following the acquisition, Pavithra Solai Jawahar and Jagannathan Veeraraghavan, Founding Members of Kint.io, will join the Swiggy team.

Dale Vaz, Head of Engineering and Data Sciences, Swiggy, said, "The team at Kint.io comes with an exceptional understanding and expertise in AI, machine learning and data sciences. This acquihire is part of Swiggy's strategy to scale our tech prowess by bringing in entrepreneurial teams that can solve unique customer problems while leveraging the network and resources at Swiggy. We provide a unique mix of strong entrepreneurial DNA and professional leadership that gives startup teams the ownership and leverage to move fast and make a big impact."

"The team joins us at a very exciting time. The focus has never been more intense on building industry-changing technology in AI and other areas. We look forward to working together on great new features and capabilities," he added.

Online ordering and food delivery business currently contributes about 65 per cent to the overall revenue of Zomato. To further expand these numbers, Zomato announces a partnership with Paytm enabling its food ordering and delivery services on Paytm’s mobile app.

Customers can now browse restaurants listed on the online delivery platform on the Paytm app as well and order food instantly. Currently live for all Paytm Android app users in Delhi-NCR, this service  will soon be made available across India and on the iOS app as well.

Zomato currently lists over 80 thousand restaurants across 120+ cities and delivers orders at a monthly order run rate of 28 million. With this integration, Zomato will be able to extend the convenience and accessibility of online food ordering to the pan-India Paytm user base as well.

Speaking on the development, Mohit Gupta, CEO, Food Delivery, Zomato said, “Paytm is the most popular digital payments platform, with extensive reach across the length and breadth of the country. We are excited to be partnering with them to integrate our online food delivery service with their mobile app. This will allow us to reach a much larger user base and add to the overall experience of ordering from Zomato.”

Paytm has a strong user-base in tier 2 & tier 3 cities, where users frequently use its services for a wide array of everyday payments and Food & Beverage is among one of the largest payment categories for Paytm both in terms of volume and number of transactions.

“Our association with Zomato is a valuable addition to our platform in bringing the convenience of ordering food online on our app. A vast majority of our customers are from the tier 2 & tier 3 cities, with this new addition we are confident of driving the growth of online food ordering further across the country,” added, Renu Satti, Senior Vice President, Paytm.

By Nusra

In a recent video posted on the social platform, Gurgaon-based food delivery and restaurant reservation platform Zomato has been caught in a controversy after one of its food delivery boy wearing the company t-shirt, carrying a company delivery bag and consuming food out of its boxed orders came into the light.

In the two-minute video, the delivery boy was then seen resealing the packages and putting them back into the delivery bag which was supposed to be delivered. The video that went viral on social platforms has received criticism from the users.

Issuing a media statement in response of the video, Zomato said, “in our commitment towards mitigating any possibility of tampering with food, Zomato will soon introduce tamper-proof tapes, and other precautionary measures to ensure we safeguard against any chances of tampering of food. Zomato has a zero-tolerance policy for tampering of food.”

The food delivery platform also mentioned in the statement that the video was shot in Madurai. “The person in the video is a delivery partner on our fleet. We have spoken to him at length - and while we understand that this was a human error in judgment, have taken him off the platform,” added the statement.

This incident only makes the commitment to fleet training, scheduling and process even stronger. “We stand behind our extensive fleet who do the right thing across many hours of the day,” it added.

Adding the delivery partners as the face of the brand, and the heart of their success in growing to become the largest food delivery platform in the country, Zomato also mentioned that the company will educate their delivery fleet of over 1.5 lakh partners to highlight or escalate any such deviations to the brand, while also encouraging the users.

By Nusra

Bengaluru based online delivery platform Swiggy has suffered disruptions in delivery service in various parts of Chennai on Wednesday.

The incident happened after delivery staffs went to a sudden strike regarding the pay related demands.

The staffs gathered at certain places in the city with the intention of communicating a list of demands towards the company’s management. Personnel speaking on behalf of the striking deliverymen said that the strike would continue indefinitely if the management did not heed to their requests.

Numbering between 20-50 at several spots in the city like Vadapalani, Mylapore and Porur, they urged the company to increase the per-order pay and “restore the incentive amounts that had been reduced recently”.

The other demands made by the working staff were the regularisation of per mile compensation, more avenues to communicate with the organisation on delivery related problems, and ensuring that personnel do not face “police harassment late in the night” when they carry out deliveries.

The Swiggy website and mobile application displayed a message that read: We’re sorry. Delivery is not possible at the moment due to unforeseen circumstances,” in certain parts of the city, while displaying a ‘location unserviceable' banner on the page.

The upcoming funding round of Swiggy, India's largest online food-delivery platform, will include an estimated $300 million worth of secondary share sales by some key backers. This will make one of the largest liquidity events for growth-stage investors in the country's startup ecosystem. 

The investment round is expected to go up to $900 million. It may push Swiggy's valuation at $2.5-3 billion.

The existing investors selling a part of their stakes in Swiggy include Bessemer Venture Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, Accel and SAIF Partners. Together, they own about 39% in the four-year-old company.

Swiggy's earliest investors, RB Investments and Harmony Partners, will be selling their entire 3% stake, making a complete exit. Other existing investors including Meituan Dianping, Coatue Management and DST Global are also expected to participate in this funding round.

Swiggy, an online food delivery startup, is close to signing a term sheet to raise up to $900 million from a group of investors led by Naspers, a South African technology conglomerate.

Apart from Naspers, Chinese internet giant Tencent Holdings may also participate in the round.

Out of the $900 million being raised, about $600 million would be invested as primary capital into Swiggy. The remaining $300 million will be used to buy shares from some of the existing investors of the company.

A person close to the deal said, "RB Investments and Bessemer Venture Partners are selling their entire stakes. Accel Partners and a couple of others are expected to sell some part of their stakes."

Swiggy is run by Bundl Technologies Pvt Ltd, a Bengaluru-based firm. It is the market leader in food delivery in India. Earlier, the company raised $210 million in a Series G round from new and existing investors led by Naspers and DST Global at a valuation of $1.3 billion.

Foodpanda, a food delivering platform, has taken 2,000 seats in co-working operator GoWork’s centre at Gurugram. 

Founded by Sanjeev Mahajan, Sudeep Singh and Nimit Mahajan in June 2017, GoWork has two co-working centres in Gurugram. These centres are spread over 8 lakh square feet with a capacity of 12,000 seats. 

Foodpanda has taken up 2,000 seats in GoWork's centre at Udyog Vihar in Gurugram under the 'built to suit' enterprise format. The company is aiming to have up to 4,000 seats.

GoWork said, "This is the highest number of seats that have been occupied by any organisation in a co-working space all over India." 

Sudeep Singh, Chief Evangelist and Co-founder, GoWork, said, "Foodpanda is one of the most recognized and trusted brands in the food-tech startup ecosystem, and having it on board as a client gives a robust boost to our brand's value proposition." 

"We have leased about 6,000 seats so far in last one year out of 12,000 seats. GoWork's spaces are equipped with diverse amenities such as gym, spa, food court, innovative and unique 'frustration/meditation' zones, in-house brewery, crèche, sleeping pods and a range of other facilities which cater perfectly to the preferences of the modern professional," he added. 

पिछले पांच हफ्तों में फूड पांडा ने अपने साथ साठ हजार डिलीवरी पार्टनर्स जोड़े हैं। इस ऑनलाइन फूड ऑर्डरिंग और डिलिवरिंग प्लेटफॉर्म की योजना अब अपने उपक्रम के विस्तार की है और 2020 तक इसकी योजना पांच लाख पार्टनर्स को अपने साथ जोड़ लेने की है।

ओला अधिकृत इस कंपनी की योजना अगले 2 महीने में साठ हजार और डिलीवरी पार्टनर्स को अपने साथ जोड़ लेने की है। फूड पांडा बड़े फूड टेक ज्वाइंट्स जैसे ज़ोमैटो और स्विगी के साथ प्रतिस्पर्धा में है।

पिछले कुछ हफ्तों में फूड पांडा ने 13 नए शहरों को जोड़कर अपने नेटवर्क को सात शहरों से बढ़ाया है। इस बढ़ोतरी में जयपुर, चंडीगढ़, कानपुर, लखनऊ, इंदौर, अहमदाबाद, नासिक और अन्य शामिल है। इस विस्तार का कारण कंपनी की गहरी पैठ बनाने की रणनीति है।

फूड पांडा के सीईओ प्रणय ज्यूरजका ने कहा, ‘’डिलीवरी पार्टनर्स हमारे मिशन का आधार हैं, जो कि हमारे उपभोक्ताओं तक, हमारे रेस्टोरेंट्स पार्टनर्स का बेहतरीन खाद्य अनुभव पहुंचाते हैं। फूड पांडा आने वाले दो सालों में डिलीवरी पार्टनर्स के लिए पांच लाख अवसर खड़े करने को प्रतिबद्ध है।‘’

कैब से अपनी शुरूआत करने वाले प्लेटफॉर्म ओला ने फूड पांडा को अपने एप में शामिल किया है, ताकि इसके उपभोक्ताओं को फूड ऑर्डरिंग संबंधी बेहतरीन अनुभव प्राप्त हो सके।

फूड पांडा का ओला एब के साथ पूर्णतः जुड़ना हमारे, करोड़ों भारतीयों तक बेहतरीन खाद्य अनुभव पहुंचाने के मिशन की तरफ एक बड़ा कदम है। अपनी तरह का ये पहला आउटरीच प्रोग्राम न केवल पहली बार इसे प्रयोग कर रहे उपभोक्ताओं को एक खूबसूरत अनुभव देगा, बल्कि ओला का प्रयोग कर रहे 150 मिलियन उपभोक्ताओं के लिए भी ये एक सतत् अनुभव उपलब्ध कराएगा।       

Foodpanda has onboarded 60,000 delivery partners in five weeks. The online food ordering and delivery platform eyes on expanding its delivery network to 5 lakh partners by 2020.

The Ola-owned company is further planning to add another 60,000 delivery partners across India in the next 2 months. Foodpanda is competing with foodtech giants like Zomato and Swiggy.

Over the past weeks, Foodpanda has expanded its network from seven cities, by adding 13 new cities, including, Jaipur, Chandigarh, Kanpur, Lucknow, Indore, Ahmedabad and Nashik among others. The expansion is part of the company's strategy to achieve deeper penetration.

Pranay Jivrajka, CEO of Foodpanda India, said, "Delivery partners are key to our mission of bringing the best food experience from our restaurant partners to our consumers. Foodpanda is committed to creating over 500,000 opportunities for delivery partners over the next couple of years." 

The cab-hailing platform Ola has also integrated Foodpanda in its app, in a bid to provide seamless food ordering experience to its users.

"Foodpanda's complete integration into the Ola app marks a huge step forward towards our mission of delivering superior food experiences to a billion Indians. This first of its kind scale and outreach will not just enable first-time online food ordering experience for millions, but also create a seamless and consistent experience for over 150 million Ola users," Jivrajka said. 

बेंगलुरु-स्थित फ़ूड डिलीवरी मंच स्विग्गी ने 'स्विग्गी पैकेजिंग असिस्ट'  के लॉन्च की घोषणा की है। ये ऐसा मार्केटप्लेस प्रोग्राम है, जो अपने मंच पर रेस्टोरेंट्स को पैकेजिंग सोल्युशन्स उपलब्ध करवाएगा। आज बाजार में इको-फ्रेंडली और फ़ूड ग्रेड सर्टिफाइड मटेरियल्स में लीकप्रूफ, स्टर्डी, स्टैकेबल और इन्सुलैंट पैकेज समेत लगभग 30 प्रोडक्ट्स पाए जाते हैं।

'स्विग्गी पैकेजिंग असिस्ट' रेस्टोरेंट्स को उनके मेनू की जरूरत के हिसाब से विभिन्न पैकिंग सोल्युशन्स उपलब्ध करवाएगा। वह रेस्टोरेंट्स को उस मटेरियल्स के वेंडर्स से जोड़ेगा। मार्केटप्लेस के बिक्रेता इन सोल्युशन्स को चुनने वाले रेस्टोरेंट्स को 5% डिस्काउंट पेश करेंगे।

स्विग्गी रेस्टोरेंट्स को उनके पैकेजिंग की गुणवत्ता सुधारने और बदले में उपभोक्ताओं की अधिक संतुष्टि और पसंद पाने में मदद करने के लिए एक ऑन-ग्राउंड टीम भी बना रही है।

प्रारंभिक अवस्था में प्रोग्राम बेंगलुरु, मुंबई और पुणे के पार्टनर्स को उपलब्ध करवाया गया है। फार्म अगले तीन महीने में उसे अन्य शहरों में भी मुहैया करवाएगी।

पिछले वर्ष अपने पार्टनर फाइनेंसिंग प्रोग्राम 'स्विग्गी कैपिटल असिसट को लॉन्च करने के बाद स्विग्गी का यह दूसरा पार्टनर-केंद्रित उपक्रम है। कम्पनी का ये दावा है कि स्विग्गी कैपिटल असिस्ट के लॉन्च के बाद से, कार्यक्रम ने 10 स्विग्गी शहरों में अतिरिक्त सक्रीय पूँजी की आसान उपलब्धि द्वारा 363 रेस्टोरेंट पार्टनर्स की व्यवसाय-वृद्धि और उसका विस्तार करने में मदद की है। 

Bengaluru-based food delivery platform Swiggy has announced the launch of ‘Swiggy Packaging Assist’, a marketplace program for enabling packaging solutions to restaurants on its platform. The marketplace currently lists close to 30 products across eco-friendly and food grade certified materials including leakproof, sturdy, stackable, and heat insulant packaging materials.

‘Swiggy Packaging Assist’ will offer restaurants access to a variety of packing solutions according to the needs of their menu. It will connect restaurants with vendors of these materials. Sellers on the marketplace will offer discounts of up to 5% to restaurants opting for these solutions. 

Swiggy is also building an on-ground team to provide customized solutions and consultation to restaurants to improve their quality of packaging and help them get higher customer ratings and satisfaction in turn.

The program has been rolled out to partners in Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune. The firm will make it accessible to the rest of the cities within the next three months.

After launching its partner financing programme ‘Swiggy Capital Assist’ last year, this is Swiggy’s second partner-focused initiative. Since the launch of Swiggy Capital Assist, the company claims that the programme has helped 363 restaurant partners across the 10 Swiggy cities to grow and expand their business through seamless access to additional working capital.

Online food delivery platform Swiggy is seeking attention from existing and new investors to raise funds at a valuation of $2.3-2.5 billion, as it burns cash at a quick pace in a fight for market share in the food delivery space, three people familiar with the matter said,

Swiggy’s rival Zomato which is backed by Ant Financial could be considered as a trigger for the third round of fund raise this year. In June Swiggy had raised $210 million from a clutch of investors in a round that valued it at $1.3 billion, making the startup the fastest to enter the haloed Unicorn Club.

Swiggy was in July offered at least one term sheet with an estimated valuation of $2.5 billion. It is unclear how much money the Bengaluru-based company is planning to raise in this round, but one of the people said it could raise anywhere between $250 million and $500 million.

The Bengaluru-based firm is also planning to raise up to $500 million, valuation may hit $2.5 billion. The round may also see the participation of Some of Swiggy’s early investors, the people said.

Swiggy held talks with a host of new investors including SoftBank, growth equity firm General Atlantic and a couple of Chinese hedge funds for the new round. The Chinese funds are probably Tybourne Capital and Hillhouse Capital, a person said. ET could not independently verify the names.