The rise of India's startup ecosystem has been silent butsteady and consistent. With over 3000 startups in 2014, India has firmly landedits place as the third largest startup ecosystem in the world just behind the US and UK. Startup benchmark company, Compass recently ranked Bangalore at 6th in terms of funding, beating the likes of London and Seattle. While this has translated to unprecedented growth in e-commerce, m-commerce and hyper-local services, it has also driven the boom in India's food tech industry.
Hungry?
India’s love for food has never been a secret. However, until recently, Indians didn’t have decent food delivery options with lackluster service and packaging provided by restaurants. With the entry of Foodpanda, this changed rather quickly and even more so, with Swiggy and TinyOwl quickly joining in. Gone are the days when Dominos was the only onlinefood ordering portal operating in India. In addition to quick service and easy ordering through website and mobile, the big discounts offered by Foodpanda, TinyOwl and similar portals have driven the growth in the Industry the pastyear. Swiggy, based in Bangalore is the only one among the bigplayers that hadn’t adopted the big discount strategy.
Swiggy’s focus on increasing availablity of restaurants and quick delivery through its own delivery system has received praise from both investors and customers alike. While it is true that the growth has largely been spearheaded by the bigplayers in restaurant food delivery – Foodpanda, Zomato and TinyOwl, theinnovation in the industry has been coming from the smaller players like Faasos and Getmefood.
The Problems
Whether it be accusations of inflating bills, predatory pricing, laying off employees or burning investor money, the boom in the industry hasn’t been without its share of controversy. The recent laying off ofemployees was the cause of much drama. Despite the issues, India’s appetite foronline food services shows no signs of slowing down.
Better things to come
While the overcrowded restaurant food ordering space may soon become saturated and see its consolidation stage, it will be interesting to see how startups like Faasos and others further drive innovation in reinventing their business model.
