Rebel Foods ₹1700 Cr. funding, Swiggy's "events" bet & MobiKwik's IPO 💸
An exciting week for India's tech-first & tech-enabled companies.
We are back with our new newsletter edition, which covers three important business topics in one go. Today, we discuss Rebel Food’s ₹1,700 Crore funding, Swiggy’s entry into the “events” space, and Mobikwik's “oversubscribed” IPO.
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Rebel Food’s ₹1,700 Cr. fundraise 🥙
First, some context.
Rebel Foods– the poster boy of India’s cloud kitchen space raised a ~₹1,700 Cr. Series G round led by Temasek. Temasek — the mighty Singapore-based sovereign wealth fund — plans to pour $10B into India in the next 3 years. It has also backed companies like Ola Electric, Zomato, Atomberg, CureFit & upGrad to name a few.
How big is Rebel Foods?
First thing first — if you didn’t know, this is the company behind 40+ brands (owned & partnered) like Faasos, Oven Story, Lunch Box, The Good Bowl, Behrouz, Sweet Truth, Firangi Bake and many more. Last year, they made ~₹1400 Cr. in revenue with a loss of ₹370 Cr. and are present in countries like the UK, the U.A.E. too.
The “cloud kitchen” reality.
In recent years, the cloud kitchen space has struggled with oversaturation, with many players jumping on the bandwagon only to realize that margins are slim due to ~20% commissions & heavy reliance on aggregator rankings for visibility. But still, a few including Biryani by Kilo, Box8, Curefoods (Nomad) have done really well.
What’s Rebel Foods moat here?
It has a solid edge as the first-mover, having a strong brand recall for its vast portfolio. But the real power lies in data—they’ve served so many cuisines across countless pin codes that they know exactly what works where. This gives them the ability to create hyper-targeted, dish-specific brands based on areas.
Plus, the company gets the offline game too. They have master-franchise licenses for all Wendy’s stores in India, run 8 Eatsure (multi-brand) & 1 OvenStory store. So, a decent sum of money could go to the offline capex too, where deeper customer loyalty could be created.Fact.
The company also runs a Rebel Launcher program where it provides full-stack tech & supply solutions for new brands to scale. An interesting addition to the topline.
Swiggy’s entry into “events” 🎙️
First, some context.
Swiggy has entered the events space, one of the hottest sectors after 10-minute food deliveries. Competing with BookMyShow and Zomato's new app, District, Swiggy is branding this vertical as “Scenes.”
How is Swiggy going about it?
Swiggy is bullish on the super-app narrative —combining food, quick commerce, dining, and events in one place. But unlike BookMyShow, which generates 60% of its revenue from movie bookings, Swiggy isn't offering movies yet. Even District, its new app, includes movies, so Swiggy will eventually need to address this gap to attract more users for that use-case.
How will brands differentiate?
The real differentiator will be the type of events each app lists and the experience they provide to organizers. Understanding the power users—whether they're into movies, mainstream concerts, indie/underground events, or comedy gigs— the clarity on curation will shape the app's listings and, in turn, its perception.
For example, tickets for “Samay Raina Unfiltered” are currently exclusive to BookMyShow. On the other hand, Insider (now District) is known for offering smaller-scale, more specialized events, in contrast to BookMyShow's large mainstream events. It’ll be interesting to see how Swiggy goes about it.
Mobikwik's ₹570 Cr. IPO 💸
First, some context.
Mobikwik made a solid entry into public markets by listing at a premium of 58% to its issue price. It was a ₹570 crore IPO, with the IPO being a fresh issue, not an OFS (Offer for sale). The retail market's response highlights the growing trust and optimism around the "fintech dhandhas" in India.
What does MobiKwik do?
The company has 2 verticals. One is the payment business, users perform everyday transactions like paying bills, UPI transfers, and recharges. Second is the lending vertical, which has products like micro-personal loans, BNPL products (MobiKwik ZIP), P2P lending, and merchant loans. Note: it’s not a NBFC and partners with other lending partners to enable such products.
Fact.
MobiKwik’s revenue stands at ₹875 Cr, which is still a fraction of its larger rivals, with Paytm generating over ₹9,900 Cr and PhonePe at ₹5,700 Cr.
What’s the bigger bet?
It has shifted its focus from low-margin payment services to high-margin lending products. Payments, once 80% of its revenue, now contribute just 36%, with BNPL and micro-lending driving the major growth. This pivot is for the push of profitability. That said, they also want to dabble with investment products like mutual funds & gold savings products. So, it’ll be interesting to see how that works.
How do you create a moat?
The real moat here lies in execution, as the products across the space are largely similar. Brands that successfully optimize user repeat rates by being the go-to-go payment option while keeping customer acquisition costs (CAC) low will gain an edge over competitors. Btw, ~90% of Mobikwik ZIP (buy-now-pay-later) users are repeat users.
Btw, we launched a special B2B compilation episode on the GrowthX Wireframe series of our Youtube channel.
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