2018 ends with a bang for Swiggy; raises $1 B led by Naspers

With the latest fund raise, the valuation of Swiggy has touched $3.3 billion

Swiggy announced it has raised $1 billion in Series H funding led by Naspers and other existing investors. This is the single largest fund raise by a foodtech company in India.

The funding round also saw participation from Meituan Dianping, Coatue Management, DST Global, Tencent, Hillhouse Capital and Wellington Management company. Avendus Capital was the exclusive financial advisor to Swiggy on the transaction.

Earlier in June, Swiggy had raised $210 million led by Naspers and DST, which made the company a part of the Unicorn club. With the recent fund raise, the foodtech company will expand its 'Access' initiative, and hire talent, especially in the engineering and machine learning space.

A few months back, competitor Zomato had raised additional funding of $210 million led by Ant Financial, which is owned by the Ali Baba Group.

Swiggy will also look to further strengthen its tech efforts and focus on an AI-driven delivery platform for hyperlocal and on-demand delivery. In a press statement, CEO Sriharsha Majety said,

“As we add more firepower to our vision of elevating quality of life for urban consumers by offering unparalleled convenience, we’re pleased that visionary global investors share our purpose and have made such a significant investment in our future.”

Swiggy claims to have seen a 3X increase in revenue in the last financial year. It has tied up with over 50,000 restaurants and has a delivery fleet of more than 1.2 lakh partners. Since its last funding round three months ago, it has launched operations in Kochi, Coimbatore, Nagpur and Lucknow, and introduced innovative payment options for consumers and delivery partners.

Larry Illg, CEO, Food and Ventures, Naspers, said in a press statement,

“We first partnered with Swiggy in April 2017 because we recognised the Swiggy team had built a sustainable, long-term business, that stood out amongst others in India. Now, nearly two years later, we have even more confidence Swiggy has the winning formula and will continue to build a leading business in the country.”

For FY17, the company posted a revenue of Rs 133.1 crore and a loss of Rs 205.2 crore. In 2017-18, it posted a revenue of Rs 23.6 crore and a loss of Rs 137.2 crore. The overall foodtech market in India is estimated to reach $2.5 billion in 2021 against $700 million at present, says research firm RedSeer. 

This year, both Swiggy and Zomato have witnessed aggressive growth. Earlier this month, Zomato acquired Lucknow-based TechEagle Innovations, whihc works exclusively on drones. With this acquisition, Zomato aims to create and use technology to enable a multi-rotor drone for hub-to-hub deliveries.

The Gurugram-based unicorn claims to have over 22 million monthly orders, and after acquiring delivery startup Runnr, it claims to have a delivery fleet of 1.5 lakh partners.