[Funding alert] Jetty Ventures invests $1M in cloud kitchen startup Yumlane

Yumlane, a Mumbai-based cloud kitchen startup owned by Qwikpik Technology Pvt Ltd, has raised a pre-Series A round of $1 million led by Singapore-based fund Jetty Ventures. 

Yumlane, which currently has 30 PoDs across Bengaluru and Pune, will use the funding for expansion in new cities and hiring.

An ex-private equity executive turned food entrepreneur, Hitesh Ahuja, Founder and CEO of Yumlane, said, 

“We believe the cloud kitchen format will be the flagbearer of the food services industry in the coming years and expect more consumers to order online food delivery vis-à-vis eat out.”

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Chirag Meswani, Managing Partner, Jetty Ventures, said:  

“Both global and Indian markets have shown a clear consumer preference towards order-in for non-occasional meals. The F&B industry has seen the QSR format carve a significant share in the eat-out food services space, especially in the organised chain segment. Conditions are right for order-in preference to carve a large share in the overall market. Cloud kitchens will be a capital-efficient format for this thesis to play out.”

“Yumlane's operations since its pivot to the cloud kitchen model in January 2019 has shown demand from the consumers. It can deliver hygiene at scale and we see the venture benefit from the post-COVID consumer preferences,” Chirag added.

The food brand platform has previously raised funds in the past from Binny Bansal (co-founder and former CEO, Flipkart), RB Investments, and Orios Venture Partners.

In early 2019, Yumlane pivoted its business model from a FMCG packaged food startup to cloud kitchen. It was founded in March 2016 by Hitesh Ahuja, Rahul Kumar, and Reuben Ghosh.

(Edited by Teja Lele Desai)