Build vs buy: With new investments, Zomato orders growth

For a founder who has been playing catch up with rival Swiggy for the past four years, Zomato’s Deepinder Goyal finds himself in an interesting position after the public offering in July. About $2 billion in the bank and a range of options to do the next thing.

Goyal, who spent 14 years building Zomato into a public market company worth $13 billion, has decided to take the path of “invest and grow” instead of developing new business lines.

This strategy is quite different from Swiggy’s ongoing efforts. For the past 18 months, Swiggy has focused on shaping its quick delivery business, Instamart, and a subscription morning delivery vertical while also testing new products such as group buying and software services.

“We want to take an investment route to building these businesses instead of building them in-house,” Goyal said in a new blog post.

The first hints of this approach came earlier this year when Zomato invested $100 million in Grofers. Now, Goyal is doubling down on the strategy and looking to deploy about half of the capital he raised into the emerging “quick-commerce” space of delivering items in under 30 mins.