Zomato's Deepinder Goyal becomes a billionaire after Zomato rally due to Blinkit's growth

Zomato’s co-founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal became a billionaire after Zomato shares surged over 300% since last year, reaching a current market cap of ₹1.8 lakh crore, Moneycontrol reported. Goyal, 41, has also become India’s richest professional manager with his net worth skyrocketing past ₹8,300 crore.

Who is Deepinder Goyal and how was Zomato founded?

Deepinder Goyal, who initially hailed from a middle class background, co-founded food delivery giant Zomato in 2008, initially calling it, ‘Foodiebay,’ along with Pankaj Chaddah at a time when both worked at Bain & Company as analysts, according to an Inc42 article. Both were graduates from IIT Delhi, with Goyal specializing in Mathematics and Computing.

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Foodiebay became the largest restaurant directory in Delhi-NCR within just nine months and it was renamed as Zomato after two years, eventually getting investments from the likes of Info Edge India, Sequoia, Vy Capital, Singapore-brd investment firm Temasek, and Alibaba’s Ant Financial.

The company became a unicorn in the financial year 2018-19, following Ant Financial’s $200 million investment. The same year, Pankaj Chaddah left the company.

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Goyal currently holds 3.95 crore shares in Zomato, amounting to a 4.24% stake in the food delivery company which also owns quick commerce giant Blinkit.

Why has Zomato's share price grown so much?

The rise of Blinkit was one of the primary reasons for the Zomato share rally. Moneycontrol cited a recent Goldman Sachs note that said Blinkit now has a higher implied value than Zomato's core food delivery business.

Blinkit is currently valued at $13 billion dollars. Zomato had acquired it in 2022 for $568 million, having owned around 10% of the company since the year prior. It is now said to be growing faster than its competitors like Swiggy’s Instamart and Zepto.

Zomato's share prices hit an all-time high of ₹232 on the Bombay Stock Exchange on Monday, after the food delivery aggregator announced a platform fee hike of ₹6 per order for markets like Delhi and Bangalore, the Economic Times reported.

Zomato shares are currently trading at ₹227.75 on the Bombay Stock Exchange as of July 15, 11:45 A.M, a 2.38% growth from the previous day.

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