After rival Zomato, Swiggy, too, launched home delivery of alcohol in Odisha on May 26, starting with capital Bhubaneswar and industrial city of Rourkela.
The Bengaluru-based food delivery platform plans to extend the service to Cuttack and Berhampur in the next couple of days.
“The service went live in Bhubaneswar and Rourkela today after obtaining necessary approvals from the Odisha government, with other major cities in the state to follow during the week,” the company said in a statement.
Earlier in the day, Zomato said it was going live in Bhubaneswar and would head to Rourkela, Balasore, Balangir, Sambalpur, Berhampur and Cuttack soon.
Odisha has become the second state after Jharkhand in recent days to allow home delivery of alcohol, with rivals Zomato and Swiggy offering the service.
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With coronavirus and the lockdown hitting their core food-delivery business hard, the two companies are looking to liquor and grocery deliveries to shore up their business.
To place orders, customers will need to upload a government ID and a selfie for age verification, which the platform would use for authentication, Swiggy said.
It has partnered with HyperVerge to enable AI-face recognition for mandatory user and age verification for alcohol deliveries.
The viral outbreak has hit their business hard, forcing the two rivals to trim the workforce and go for salary cuts.
Swiggy on May 18 laid off 1,100 people and shut down some of its businesses. Two days earlier, Zomato had announced a plan to let go of around 500 staff and cut by up to 50 percent the salary of the remaining employees for six months.
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