Company Profile is an initiative by ListMyStartUp to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Zepto.
The digital demand for smart applications is exploding like it was never before. To satisfy our daily food needs, we all buy groceries. You only need an app on your Android phone to have all of your grocery orders delivered to your comfortable couch, eliminating the need to go to the store for your daily requirements. With only a few taps on your mobile device, you can get your groceries now.
Companies are working to reduce the time it takes to deliver groceries in the groceries delivery business. Weezy, Gorillas, Jokr, Swiggy Instamart, Grofers, are some of the companies from all over the world that are competing with the primary goal of reducing delivery time and transporting supplies in 10-15 minutes, and so is Zepto.
Zepto is not another grocery delivery app but a platform that promises 10-minute deliveries of groceries, built in order to revolutionise the selling and deliveries of groceries. With Zepto by their side, the customers can conveniently purchase from 2500+ products and get them delivered to their doorstep with the help of Zepto's 10-minute e-grocery delivery app.
Know more about Zepto, a grocery store that delivers, its Funding and Investors, Business model, Revenue model, Startup story, Founders and Team, Logo, Growth, Challenges, Competitors and more, in this article.
Zepto - Company Highlights
Startup Name-Zepto
- Legal Name-KiranaKart Technologies Private Limited
- Headquarters-Parel, Maharashtra, India
- Industry-Delivery, Delivery Service, and Grocery
- Founders-Aadit Palicha, and Kaivalya Vohra
- Founded-2021
- Total Funding-$360 mn (May 2022)
- Valuation-$900 mn (May 2022)
- Areas Served-India
- Current CEO-Aadit Palicha
- Website-www.zeptonow.com
About Zepto
Zepto, a startup based in Mumbai, offers a 10-minute groceries delivery service. Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra launched Zepto, a company known to deliver groceries in 10 minutes.
Specialising in delivering groceries before the turn of a year is what Zepto is hailed for. It has worked with 86+ dark store owners in thirteen different areas in 2021, generating over one million deliveries. To fulfil orders promptly, Zepto employs its network of 'cloud shops' or micro-warehouses.
Zepto's secret of the trade lies in its capacity to routinely produce 2,500+ goods for delivery in under ten minutes. It's at the heart of everything the firm does, and it's why they've been able to grow so quickly while maintaining incredible client loyalty.
With the dark store idea, the Parel-based rapid grocery delivery business has slashed the time it takes to deliver groceries to only 10 minutes. According to reports, rapid commerce is the next major thing the supermarket delivery sector is hoping to capitalize on. Startups like Zepto in India and Fridge No More in New York City are among the fastest-growing companies in the faster-delivery business.
Zepto - Industry
E-grocery delivery is gathering traction in India with a $1 trillion retail market where grocery purchases make up the vast majority of consumer spending. The Indian e-grocery market was valued at $2.9 billion in 2020, and it is expected to grow at a rate of 37.1% from 2021 to 2028.
The sector has expanded in prevalence in the past months as a result of evolving customer habits, growing urbanisation, and a tech-savvy generation who prefers to make online purchases.
A RedSeer report mentioned that the quick commerce segment was valued at $30 mn in 2021. The same segment was predicted to become a $5 bn market in 2025, growing by 15X.
As their standard of living increase and their daily schedules get tighter, consumers are flocking to customised and convenient internet platforms for grocery shopping instead of walking down to the local shops.
Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the popularity of online grocery delivery became increasingly evident. As a consequence of social distancing constraints, consumers are converting to online grocery shopping, which is not only convenient but also safer.
Zepto - Founders and Team
Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, both 19-year-old childhood pals, created Zepto after walking out of Stanford University's renowned computer science department to return to their home, India, and start up a business. The firm was founded in September of last year and began operations in April of this year.
Aadit Palicha
Aadit Palicha is the CEO and Co-Founder of both KiranaKart and Zepto. After completing an IB diploma from GEMS Education in Mathematics and Computer Science, Palicha finished a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Stanford University. Aadit then completed Y Combinator Grade: W21, and started with PryvaSee as a Project Lead. Aadit Palicha then founded GoPool, his first startup, when he was just 17. He left the same in April 2020 and founded KiranaKart and then Zepto.
Kaivalya Vohra
Kaivalya Vohra is the Co-Founder and CTO of KiranaKart and the Co-Founder and CTO of Zepto. He is also a Stanford University graduate in Computer Science, and went in Y Combinator as well, along with Aadit.
Zepto has an employee strength ranging between 51 and 200 employees.
Zepto - Startup Story
Many of us have "startup ideas," but even the most creative among us struggle to see them through. Palicha and Vohra had both enrolled at Stanford to earn a Computer Science degree but had dropped out to follow their business passions instead.
During the Covid-19 outbreak, the concept for Zepto sprang from the limitations of their houses. A surge in demand for delivery services meant that groceries and other necessities would arrive in a couple of days, creating a void for quick delivery. As a result, Zepto was created with all this insight.
These teenagers were abruptly detained, because of Covid norms, detained in their Mumbai homes after significant collaboration on many projects, including a ride-hailing commuting app for kids. Even while grocery delivery, which was deemed important by local authorities, was still permitted across much of the nation as the virus spread, the duo battled to get their provisions as the illness expanded.
While Zepto is the focus of attention, Palicha and Vohra's first venture, KiranaKart, did not receive the same acclaim. Zepto, on the other hand, is inspired by KiranaKart. KiranaKart, like its name implies, was a supermarket delivery service. It had made arrangements with Kirana merchants to provide groceries in 45 minutes or less. A $730,000 pre-seed round was led by Global Founders Capital, 2 AM Ventures, Contrary Capital, and angel investors. At the time, Vohra and Palicha planned to make the first 1.5 lakh deliveries at a cost of Rs 1.
Zepto - Mission and Vision
As two bachelors living alone, the founders found it most difficult to obtain food, therefore they focused their applications on grocery delivery. So, whereas KiranaKart, their first startup, tried to make grocery delivery easier for kiranas, Zepto aims to shorten delivery times.
Zepto - Name, Logo, and Tagline
The firm, which uses the term "Zepto" to denote "a factor of 10⁻²¹, i.e. 0.000000000000000000001," named after a minuscule unit of time, offers a 10-minute grocery delivery service, surpassing numerous well-funded competitors.
Zepto's tagline says, "Groceries delivered in 10 minutes."
Zepto - Business Model, and Revenue Model
Zepto delivers groceries in ten minutes through a system of dark storefronts and mini-warehouses, on up to 90% of orders. Zepto works in the quick commerce segment of India. It is designed to be customer-centric and built around the instant service model.
To ensure a flawless delivery experience, Aadit says that their average delivery time is 8 minutes and 47 seconds. Through a chain of dark stores or retail distribution centres, the Mumbai-based company employs a hotspot method to cater largely to digital purchases.
A dark store is a tiny neighbourhood storehouse that customers cannot visit but purchase online to get packaged delivery. While dark stores are not new to the Indian industry, Aadit believes that the idea has yet to be completely explored. Population, traffic dynamics, topography, road patterns, weather conditions, last-mile operational improvement, real estate prices, and other geographic data and local intelligence are aids Zepto in optimising its connectivity. Furthermore, the startup's dark warehouses and cool rooms are custom-designed to satisfy particular criteria such as ease of travel, allowing packers to move as swiftly as possible to fill orders.
Location intelligence and geographic data, such as topography, population, road patterns, traffic dynamics, weather, last-mile supply availability, real estate values, and so on, are said to help Zepto optimize its network.
Zepto Marketing
Zepto marketing is one of the best that recent companies have seen in India, which contributes significantly to the growth that Zepto witnessed within such a short span of time. L&K Saatchi & Saatchi was behind 3 of Zepto's recent ads that promoted its products and services.
Zepto has rolled out new campaigns featuring celebrated singers like Kailash Kher, Shankar Mahadevan & Usha Uthup together to promote the company during the IPL season of 2022, and both are unique and melodic for the audiences.
Zepto - Funding, and Investors
Zepto raised $360+ mn in total in funding over 4 rounds to date. The last funding round (Series D) was raised by Zepto on May 2, 2022, which helped the company raise $200 mn. With this, Zepto has neared the unicorn valuation. The startup is currently valued at $900 million, as of May 3, 2022. The Zepto seed funding was led by Contrary in September 2020.
Zepto - Growth
Zepto is growing in Bengaluru, Mumbai, and Delhi-NCR, with Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, and Kolkata to follow in the coming months. Its technical office is in Bengaluru, while its operations are in Mumbai. Dream11, Flipkart, Pharmeasy, Uber and Pepperfry have all hired key executives for Zepto.
Engineering, operations, marketing, and financial positions are also available at Zepto. Palicha claims that month-over-month growth is 200%, with a monthly retention rate of 78%.
Zepto has witnessed an 800% q-o-q revenue growth, and its burn has come down by 5X on a per-order basis. Zepto's 10-minute delivery strategy can now inventory and delivery 3000+ goods. The startup's annualised revenue growth was noted as between $200-400 million when last reported on May 2, 2022. This figure is expected to grow to at least $1 bn by the quarter of March next year. In recent months, Zepto has claimed to grow by 50% each month, and this growth is attributed to the growth that Zepto boasts of. Furthermore, in the most recent quarter, Zepto has claimed to have grown by 800% along with slashing its expenditure by more than 5X.
Zepto - Challenges
Zepto has encountered some challenges lately, and in one of the recent ones, there were instances of a founder and investor impropriety within the quick commerce delivery startup. Ansh Nanda, an alleged co-founder of the startup said that he was forced to relinquish his stakes in the startup by the other cofounders and by Nexus Ventures. This was carried forward by Nanda, who lodged an FIR against the cofounders of Zepto and the Nexus Ventures partner, Suvir Sujan. However, the co-founders responded to the same without much delay by approaching the Delhi High Court. Zepto is the third startup that is backed by Nexus and where one of the cofounders has been named in an FIR. YoloBus and Acko were two other companies that dealt with the same before.
Zepto - Competitors
There are many businesses that compete with Zepto and have already been driving fast-paced delivery of groceries like:
- Swiggy Instamart
- Big Basket
- Blinkit
Both Swiggy and Big Basket have already begun delivering groceries between 10-15 minutes and Blinkit is all set to begin 10-minute grocery deliveries in 10 cities, which are all competing with Zepto. Dunzo is another startup, which uses its Xpress Mart dark shop network to deliver groceries in Bengaluru in 19 minutes, and competes with Zepto.
Zepto - Future Plans
The cash will be used by the Mumbai-based firm to increase the number of dark stores in additional locations, grow its client base, and hire more workforce. It is now available in Bengaluru and the Delhi-National Capital Region, with Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, and Kolkata to follow in the following 30 days.
By the end of the year, it hopes to have 100 dark businesses open, serving roughly 100 pin codes. Quick commerce is predicted to reach $300 million by the end of this year, according to a research group, and will expand to $5 billion by 2025.
The Co-founder Palicha explained that no one has completely mastered marketing in India. He further said that when you examine a few older organisations that are attempting to implement this approach, you'll notice that many of them are unfocused and lack the consistency to operate on a single model. They get involved in several different things, which is the greatest issue in every major firm.
“We have seen our median delivery times stabilise if not decrease, mainly because as we scale our coverage and our expansion, it ends up being a factor of individual cloud stores and how they perform,” he said.
Express delivery is not a novel notion; most existing e-grocers have attempted it previously, with mixed results. Following the Covid-19 pandemic's faster uptake of online groceries, these platforms have been bringing back speedy delivery to consumers, primarily under the dark-store model.
FAQs
What does Zepto do?
Zepto, a startup based in Mumbai, offers a 10-minute grocery delivery service.
Who founded Zepto?
Zepto was founded by Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, two childhood friends.
When was Zepto founded?
Zepto was founded in September 2020 and began operations in April 2021.
Which companies do Zepto compete with?
Swiggy Instamart and BigBasket, which deliver in fifteen-thirty minutes, compete with Zepto, as does Blinkit, which aims to provide 10-minute food deliveries in ten cities in India. It also competes with Dunzo, which uses its Xpress Mart dark shop network to deliver groceries in Bengaluru in 19 minutes.
How many dark stores Zepto works with?
Zepto has worked with over 86 dark stores in 2021 itself.
What is Zepto ownership?
Digging into the latest Zepto ownership, it can be found that Nexus Venture Partners is the highest shareholder of the company with a 20.07% of stake in the company. Some other shareholders of the company are:
- Y Combinator - 14.80%
- Kavit Palicha - 13.66%
- Jaideep Vohra - 11.38%
- Lachy Groom - 10.32%
- Glade Groups - 8.70%
- Rocket Internet - 5.20%
- Others - 4.18%
- Oliver Jung - 3.55%
- Contrary Capital - 2.53%
- Kaiser Foundation - 1.53%
- Aadit Palicha - 1.52%
- Kaivalya Vohra - 1.26%
- Global Founder Capital - 1.20%
