Zomato to raise $600 Mn at over $3 Bn valuation

Online food delivery and restaurant discovery platform Zomato is in advanced talks to raise $600 million in a funding round led by existing Chinese investor Ant Financial.

The round is also reported to witness the participation from Singapore-headquartered Temasek. Additionally, a bunch of hedge funds may pool in about $150-200 million in it.

The post-money valuation after this round is expected to go over $3 billion, which is a significant jump from $2-billion valuation in March this year.

Zomato's last major funding round took place eight months back when Delivery Hero had led $62 million in it for a 2.26% stake.

The Gurugram-headquartered company would deploy the fresh proceeds to strengthen its food delivery, dining out and sustainability.

If the deal gets through, Ant Financial's would hold a 29% stake, which is a 6% increase from earlier holdings.

The development is taking place after Zomato declared its financial performance for the first half (H1) of the fiscal year ending on March 31, 2020, or FY20.

The firm had claimed an increase of about 225% in its half-yearly revenues to $205 million. The funding round will help it further stands against its rival Swiggy, which is also in talks to raise $500 million from Korea Investment Partners, Mirae Asset Management and others, at a valuation of approx $4 billion.

At present, Zomato claims to host more than 1.4 million active restaurants and deliver about 40 million orders a month. Of late, the company has been facing the wrath of outlet partners and the restaurant association over deep discounting and its subscription programme - Zomato Gold.

This development was reported first by ET.