Foodtech unicorn Swiggy calls in bidders for delivery of groceries and more using drones
About 25 percent of foodtech giant Swiggy's overall revenue come from its non-food delivery business which includes Instamart, Swiggy Genie and SuprDaily.
Bengaluru-based foodtech giant has announced on Tuesday, February 22, 2022, that it is calling all bidders in the drone-as-a-services segment to help execute its drone delivery plans.
The foodtech unicorn took to LinkedIn to invite bidders. It further mentioned that the delivery of grocery and essential items with the use of drones will be deployed in several cities and for a period of six months to start with. However, the duration of deployment of these drones "may be amended from time to time," the post read.
Reportedly, Swiggy will be deploying drone delivery services in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, and Goa, to begin with.
This comes after Swiggy announced in last December that it will be investing $700 million in its instant grocery delivery service Instamart.
Sriharsha Majety, CEO of Swiggy had earlier told YourStory that Instamart was expected to reach an annualised GMV run rate of $1 billion in the next three quarters.
Reportedly about 25 percent of Swiggy's overall revenue come from its non-food delivery business which includes Instamart, Swiggy Genie and SuprDaily.
Back in 2020, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCI) had approved 13 companies to use drones to enable drone deliveries during the COVID-19-induced nationwide lockdown. Swiggy and its competitor Zomato were two of the 13 companies receiving permission from the DGCI. Prior to this, the Ministry of Civil Aviation had provided exemptions for the use of drones only for photography and non-commercial purposes.
Post this, Swiggy has been trying to deploy drones for doorstep deliveries for some time now. Earlier in June last year, YourStory had reported Swiggy's association with ANRA Technologies to begin the trials for drone deliveries in the country.
As many as 352 drones trials were conducted for 100-plus flight hours and covering 1,100 kms of incident-free operations. At that time, Dale Vaz, CTO at Swiggy said:
"Technology and innovation have always been at the forefront of everything we do at Swiggy and have been investing in future technologies to deliver unparalleled convenience to our consumers. Through our partnership with ANRA Technologies, we have been exploring the possibilities and use cases of drone flights in India and are excited about the potential that drones have to offer. The recently concluded pilot will help pave the way for usage of commercial drones in enabling the middle and last mile journey for our consumers.”
In July last year, Swiggy raised $1.25 billion investment. The round was led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Prosus. More recently, the foodtech giant raised $700 million in January, in a round led by Invesco. Post the round, Swiggy's valuation stands at $10.7 billion, reported YourStory, up from its previous $5.5 billion.
New investors-- Baron Capital Group, Sumeru Venture, IIFL AMC Late Stage Tech Fund, Kotak, Axis Growth Avenues AIF-I, Sixteenth Street Capital, Ghisallo, Smile Group, and Segantii Capital, participated in the round.
The bidding started the request for proposal and all related details are available here.
Edited by Anju Narayanan