Sriharsha Majety wins ET Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Swiggy's scale up and diversification

In just five years of starting up, Swiggy cofounder Sriharsha Majety has built one of the largest online food delivery companies that can rival many global counterparts in size.

Its rapid scale up and diversification into areas outside of food delivery made Majety the elite jury’s choice for Entrepreneur of the Year this year.

Widely known for his execution skills in the fledgling consumer internet industry, Majety has expanded Swiggy into several new areas, launching grocery delivery, on-demand concierge and a bunch of private label food brands over the past year, as he sets sight beyond food delivery.

“It’s very exciting to get validation for the work we’re doing at Swiggy and thanks to the many people who’ve helped us get this far,” said Majety on winning the award. “I think our focus on customer service has helped us get here and is what will push us in the future as well.”

Swiggy has grown from clocking around 700,000 orders a day till a year ago to doubling that number to 1.4 million daily orders today, becoming among the fastest growing Indian consumer internet startups.

Aside of the genetic growth, Swiggy’s diversification foray has been pushed by Majety’s belief that hyper-local deliveries are at the core of great customer service.

Swiggy’s expansion beyond food started in September last year when it acquired hyper-local delivery startup Supr Daily. Seen as a bid to utilise its already large fleet, now at 2.1 lakh agents, to deliver for categories beyond food, within six months the company launched Swiggy Stores—a rival to Dunzo and BigBasket—that curates inventory from stores near users’ locations to deliver everything from flowers to health supplements.

Swiggy’s diversification mirrors that of China’s largest food delivery network Meituan-Dianping, which has a small stake in the company. “The capability of having India’s largest delivery fleet will be a key driver towards building many businesses over time,” said Majety. “That’s the one thing that I am very happy about having built and we will continue to invest in it.”

Its expansion is being funded by a $1-billion cheque investors cut for Swiggy in December last year, $650 million of which came from its largest backer, South African internet and media conglomerate Naspers. This also valued the company at $3.3 billion, making it among the most valuable internet firms in the country.

In a recent interview with ET, Bob van Dijk, the group CEO of Prosus and Naspers, while talking about Majety and the competition Swiggy faces against Zomato said, “The reason why we are so comfortable with Swiggy is basically that Harsha and his team have shown their abilities to execute really well. I think we have our bet on the winner, and the potential of the market is huge”.

Losses, however, continue to mount for Swiggy and its monthly cash burn of $40-50 million is being questioned.

In the year ended March 31, 2018, its losses soared 93% to ₹397 crore on revenue of ₹422 crore, but its revenue growth zoomed 232%.

Source:- https://retail.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/food-entertainment/food-services/sriharsha-majety-wins-et-entrepreneur-of-the-year-award-for-swiggys-scale-up-and-diversification/71375032