Zomato may have new Blinkit ‘plans’ to challenge Amazon, Flipkart |

Zomato is reportedly planning for a major push against e-commerce marketplaces like Amazon and Flipkart. The Deepinder Goyal-led company is reportedly planning to add brands across a variety of new categories to its 10-minute delivery platform, Blinkit.
A report by The Economic Times, cited multiple people aware of the plans to reveal that this major push into the fast-growing direct-to-consumer (D2C) space will help the Gurgaon-based firm to build its own supply chain, source branded products directly and even manage stock.These products from the new categories will be delivered through Blinkit, the report noted.
One of the sources also mentioned that Zomato is scaling up its quick commerce operations and have already “had conversations with individual brand owners for various categories to stock up inventory. This is being seen as a potential long-term growth driver.”
Just like major marketplaces, this move wouldn’t involve the company directly owning inventory; instead it will just manage the flow of products for D2C brands like Amazon and Flipkart. However, Zomato hasn’t made its plans official yet.

How Zomato is trying to scale up BlinkIt’s operations

The report cited another source who added that Zomato has reportedly attempted to acquire and merge ecommerce enablement firm Shiprocket at least twice as part of the strategy. However, Shiprocket, which works with several D2C brands, didn’t agree to the deal.

According to Tracxn, Zomato bought a stake in Shiprocket in 2021. Currently, the company owns 6.6% shares of the logistics provider. Moreover, Zomato has also leased one warehouse each in New Delhi and Mumbai to support Blinkit’s ecommerce push as the talks between the two companies continue.

Apart from the food delivery and the quick commerce business, Zomato also operates in the business-to-business grocery supply space with Hyperpure, an event ticketing vertical called Zomaland as well as a dining out vertical.
Commenting on Blinkit’s growth, an industry analyst also said: “New-age D2C brands in categories like home needs, small electronics, beauty and personal care are looking at quick commerce as a growing channel for sales. Blinkit has a strong footing there. Now, Zomato wants to set up a backend structure, where it would work directly with brands and help them sell on Blinkit. With this, the company gets greater control over its supply chain.”