Zomato raises $160 mn in funding; plans IPO

The IPO will be sometime in the first half of next year.

Info Edge on Thursday said its investee company Zomato has raised $160 million (about Rs 1,173 crore) in funding from Tiger Global and Temasek Holdings subsidiary MacRitchie Investments, valuing the online food ordering platform at $3.3 billion.

"Zomato Pvt Ltd has closed a primary fund raise of $100 million from Tiger Global Management, LLC (through its investment vehicle Internet Fund VI Pte Ltd and/or any of its affiliates), and $60 million from MacRitchie Investments Pte Ltd, an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary of Temasek Holdings and/or any of its affiliates," Info Edge said in a regulatory filing.

The transaction valued Zomato at a post-money valuation of $3.3 billion (exchange rate of Rs 76 per US dollar), it added.

"On a fully converted and diluted basis, Infoedge's effective stake in Zomato stand at 22.2 per cent," the filing said.

Comments from Zomato could not be elicited immediately.

In January, Info Edge had informed the stock exchanges about Zomato raising $150 million (over Rs 1,065 crore) from existing investor Ant Financial at a pre-money valuation of $3 billion.

Zomato -- which competes aggressively with Prosus-backed Swiggy in the Indian market -- plans to go for an initial public offering (IPO) in the first half of 2021, its founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal told employees on Thursday.

In an e-mail to them, accessed by PTI, Goyal said: "Our finance/legal teams are working hard to take us to IPO sometime in the first half of next year."

"The value of our business is going up dramatically, all thanks to the hard work and commitment of our team.

“We hope to create a lot of value for our current employees who have ESOPs sometime in the next year," he added.

The IPO is around the corner and waiting a little longer will result in significantly more value creation for all, he added.

On the company's fund raising, Goyal said: "We have raised a lot of money, and today, our cash in the bank (around $250 million) is more than ever in our history," and added that Tiger Global, Temasek, Baillie Gifford and Ant Financial have already participated in the company's current round, and there are more big names joining the round.

"...we estimate that our current round will end up with us at $600 million (around Rs 4,400 crore) in the bank very soon," he further said noting that this cash would be treated as a "war-chest" for future M&A, and fighting off competition in various areas of the business.

The online food delivery segment has seen significant growth in the last few years with Zomato and Swiggy competing head-on to grab market share.

Earlier this year, Zomato acquired the Indian business of Uber Eats in an all-stock deal that will give the ride hailing company 9.99 per cent stake in Zomato.

Info Edge had said its shareholding in Zomato stood at about 22.71 per cent on fully converted and diluted basis upon closing of the transaction.

Interestingly, in May this year, Amazon India threw its hat in the ring and announced the launch of its food delivery operations in select parts of Bengaluru.

The announcement was made at a time when Zomato and Swiggy had announced laying off over 1,600 employees as business was impacted by the COVID-induced lockdown.

During this time, Zomato and Swiggy also ventured into the area of grocery delivery.

In July, Zomato had said its FY20 revenue jumped over two-fold to $394 million (around Rs 2,960 crore) in FY20 from the previous fiscal, while its Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization (EBITDA) loss was at around Rs 2,200 crore in FY2019-20.

"Moving our business towards profitability was a core focus for us in FY20 and we made significant progress along that journey...In terms of the size of the business, COVID-19 has set us back by a year or so, but a year is only a small blip when one is building a company for the next 100 years," Zomato had said.

Photograph: Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters