Swiggy has launched a new speed food delivery service branded “Bolt,” which promises to deliver meals in under ten minutes. “Bolt” initially is operational in six major cities: Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi, and Pune.
Rohit Kapoor, Swiggy Food Marketplace Chief Executive Officer, said the service is designed to provide an increase in demand from consumers for fast food delivery services. Kapur added that gradually, Bolt would expand to other cities based on feedback from customers.
The Bolt service will focus on hot-selling food items such as burgers, drinks, breakfast items, and biryani, all of which take mere minutes to prepare. It will also provide ready-to-pack items like ice creams, snacks, and sweets. Kapoor, on LinkedIn, challenged customers to pick up their meals quicker than it takes for Bolt to deliver. ‘Pick it faster than Bolt can. Bolt is coming to a city near you very soon.’
This is a time when Swiggy is getting ready for its much-awaited IPO. Shareholders have agreed to raise the fresh issue component of the IPO from ₹3,750 crore to ₹5,000 crore. This brings in the extra ₹1,250 crores, and if done so, the IPO size could reach a total amount of ₹11,664 crore, including an offer-for-sale of ₹6,664 crore.
The notable interest comes from high-profile investors that include former cricket players, Rahul Dravid and Zaheer Khan, tennis player Rohan Bopanna, filmmaker Karan Johar, and Ashish Chowdhry, an actor, who showed interest in buying stakes in the firm even before its market debut.
Shareholders have been expected to sanction the increase in size of the primary issue by voting at an extraordinary general meeting held on 3 October. The offer-for-sale component is unchanged and is no different from the previously proposed values.
The total size will reach ₹10,414 crores, or $1.4 billion if funds are realized. Swiggy’s public offering is expected to be one of the largest by a new-age company. The company will make all its final preparations for its IPO later in the year after months of planning.
Accel, SoftBank, and Prosus hold shares, respectively of 6 percent, 8 percent, and 32 percent. Other key investors holding stakes in the firm include Elevation Capital, DST Global, Norwest, Tencent, Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), and Singapore’s GIC, among many others.
