Zomato steps up restaurant signups as slowdown bites

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Zomato last week indicated restaurant additions on its platform as a significant contributor to the 27% year-on-year growth in the gross order value (GOV) at its food-delivery business, considering that the company is witnessing a broader slowdown in discretionary spending.

A look at Zomato's total number of food-delivery restaurant partners over the last eight quarters shows that the Gurugram-based company has stepped up onboarding of new restaurants on the platform.

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The sequential growth in restaurant addition has improved since falling to a negative 0.5% in October-December 2022 from 7% in the three-month period ended December 2021, to again nearly 7% in the third quarter of FY24.

In a post-earnings analyst call on Thursday, Zomato chief financial officer Akshant Goyal pointed out that a significant portion of new restaurants it added to the platform were cloud kitchens.

As on December 31, the company had 254,000 restaurant partners, compared with 238,000 on September 30.

In Zomato’s quarterly shareholder letter, food-delivery CEO Rakesh Ranjan noted that the demand environment was muted in the December quarter for the broader restaurant industry. “Hence, food delivery GOV growth (at 6.3% QoQ /27% YoY) was lower than our expectations but still