Continuing its aggressive shopping spree, Reliance Retail has picked up a huge stake in the Bengaluru based Dunzo, quick commerce startup, for a whopping $200 million.
The retail arm of Mukesh Ambani led Reliance Industries has been busy in adding items to shopping cart lately, as the company invested $240 million in the latest round of funding from its kitty.
According to the official statement of the company, Reliance Retail has picked a 25.8 percent stake in Dunzo. Existing investors of the startup including Lightbox, Lightrock, 3L Capital and Alteria Capital also participated in this round.
India's largest conglomerate access to Dunzo establishes the fact that the domestic behemoth has been bullish on the rapid delivery, which is the latest and hottest theme attracting the bevy of the investors.
Reliance Retail said that the capital will be used for the growth and expansion of Dunzo to make it the largest quick commerce player in the nation, enabling instant delivery of essentials from a network of micro warehouses.
The company is also eyeing to expand its business to business (B2B) vertical to enable logistics services for local merchants in the Indian cities.
The deal gives Dunzo ammunition to compete against Blinkit (erstwhile known as Grofers), another newbie upstart Zepto, Swiggy-owned Instamart, and BigBasket, among others to deliver groceries and essential items to urban households quickly.
This is Reliance’s second major entry of sorts into the grocery delivery space, besides its own JioMart service. It also acquired Milkbasket last year, which delivers milk and daily staples to households in Delhi, Bengaluru, and other cities.
According to earlier reports, Dunzo held conversations with Zomato, Swiggy and Tata Group for investment, but somehow, the deal could not be sealed.