Swiggy, the Indian food delivery giant, seeks $1.25 billion in IPO after receiving shareholder approval

Swiggy plans to raise $1.25 billion in an initial public offering and has secured approval from its shareholders, the Indian food delivery and instant commerce startup disclosed in a filing to the local regulator.

The Bengaluru-headquartered startup, which competes with publicly-listed Zomato and StepStone Group-backed unicorn Zepto, plans to raise $450 million through issuance of new shares and offer $800 million of shares from existing backers in the IPO, it wrote in a filing to the Ministry of Corporate Affairs.

The Indian startup ecosystem has been eagerly anticipating Swiggy’s public debut, which is slated for later this year. Swiggy counts Prosus, Accel, SoftBank and Invesco among its backers. It was last valued at $10.7 billion in a funding round unveiled in early 2022. Some of its investors, including Invesco and Baron, have since publicly marked up the valuation of Swiggy to over $12 billion. Zomato topped $20 billion in market cap earlier this month.

Swiggy had earlier intended to go public in 2023, TechCrunch previously reported, but deferred the plan due to not-so-favorable market conditions.

Swiggy commands about 45.8% of the Indian food delivery market and clocked a GMV of $2.57 billion in that business in 2023, Bernstein analysts wrote in a recent note. It serves between 16 million to 17 million monthly transacting users and works with a network of about 375,000 delivery personnels, the analysts said.

The startup’s food delivery business, operational in 600 Indian cities, has been profitable, it has said in the past.

Swiggy today faces fierce competition from Zomato, which today also commands the market leading position in the instant commerce business. (Zomato acquired Blinkit for $568 million in mid-2022.)

“Despite Zomato being a late entrant in the food delivery market, has gone from a laggard in CY19 to gaining market share in the duopoly. Both players were similar size in CY20 at $ 1.2 Bn,” Bernstein analysts wrote.

This is a developing story. More to follow.