Deepinder Goyal says without Blinkit, Zomato 'would be done' in 10 years: 'It was survival instinct'

Deepinder Goyal said that without Blinkit, Zomato 'would be done' in 10 years.

Deepinder Goyal has said that Zomato 'would be done' in 10 years if it had not bought Blinkit (formerly Grofers) for $568 millionin 2022. "It was survival instinct," the Zomato co-founder and CEO added.

Speaking ET Startup Awards held recently in Bengaluru, he said, "Getting into runner and last-mile (delivery) was something we needed to do to survive. Blinkit was a survival instinct deal." Goyal added that last-mile food delivery network or the numbers of delivery partners is quite large and a quick commerce company that has that large a rider fleet can easily enter the food sector. "But food can't enter the quick commerce business easily because you have the dark stores, the supply chain etc. Food delivery is only 10 percent as hard as Blinkit," he said.

The Zomato boss added that in hindsight people can talk about the company's vision and strategy in acquiring Blinkit but in reality, the company did what it had to to survive.

At the event, Goyal also said that quick commerce companies such as Blinkit are not affecting the business of kirana or local departmental stores or even supermarts like DMart, it is eating into the segment controlled by online retailers including Amazon and Flipkart.

"The growth of quick commerce has been a surprise for us as well," he said. "We didn't think it would grow this much. Blinkit is not really eating into the kiranawalas at all. Blinkit is also not affecting companies like DMart because the DMart CEO also said recently on a call that quick commerce is not affecting them. So, I think we are more or less eating into Amazon and Flipkart's e-commerce sector as well as the modern retailers in larger cities."