Saturday, April 20

Tag: Food

From Booking Ticket to Ordering Meal, All on New Rail Application Soon
News

From Booking Ticket to Ordering Meal, All on New Rail Application Soon

A seamless travel experience for rail commuters with a swipe of a finger is in the offing as Railways plans to revamp its mobile application and include “all passenger services” for its customers. “We are preparing an integrated mobile application for railway passengers which will take care of all their needs. “It will be an app that will take care of the entire journey — from booking a ticket to booking a taxi, pre-ordering a meal, requesting for porter services, lodging at a retiring room, ordering a bed roll, complaining about lack of cleanliness in a coach, accessing digital entertainment, reserving a hotel, booking an airline ticket in case of a waitlisted rail ticket, among other services,”said an official from the Non-Fare Directorate of the Railway Ministry. Ern...
Food Ordering Startup InnerChef Raises $2.5 million Funding
FUNDING

Food Ordering Startup InnerChef Raises $2.5 million Funding

InnerChef, Gurugram-based food ordering platform has raised $2.5 million funding led by Japanese early-stage fund Mistletoe with participation from Singapore-based M&S Partners and existing investors. Prior to this, InnerChef had raised around Rs 11 crore funding from a clutch of investors including Paytm's Vijay Shekhar Sharma, redBus co-founder Phanindra Sama, Shaadi.com's Anupam Mittal and GOQii founder Vishal Gondal among others. Anand Chandrasekaran, Facebook Messenger's head of platform/partnerships and formerly the chief product officer at Snapdeal, is also an investor in InnerChef. The company plans to use the funds raised to focus on its top markets - Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad. "We plan to invest the money in building a brand. We have started adding more k...
Indonesia Based GO-JEK Acquires Bangalore Based Startup Pianta
ACQUISITION

Indonesia Based GO-JEK Acquires Bangalore Based Startup Pianta

Indonesia's based food and grocery delivery startup GO-JEK has acquired Bangalore based Pianta, a marketplace for home healthcare services, for an undisclosed sum. Post the acquisition, Pianta's eight member team will merge with GO-JEK's engineering centre in Bangalore. Founded in 2010, GO-JEK has over two lakh motorbike taxis, known as "ojeks" in its fleet. Since then, the company has diversified into food, grocery and even courier delivery services. GO-JEK raised $550 million in 2016 from the likes of KKR, Warburg Pincus, Farallon Capital and Capital Group Private Markets. In India, GO-JEK doesn't have any services but has an engineering centre in Bangalore where it employs 60 people."Pianta's core team comes from Ola and Flipkart and their expertise in the logistics and payments s...
Swiggy Raises Rs 100 Crore from Bessemer Venture Partners
FUNDING

Swiggy Raises Rs 100 Crore from Bessemer Venture Partners

Food ordering and delivery platform Swiggy said it has raised $15 million in a fourth strategic round of funding (Series D) from Bessemer Venture Partners, with existing investors also participating. The freshly raised funds are expected to fuel company's next growth phase, with an improved customer experience. This will include technology upgrades, a wider spread of restaurants to choose from and better delivery efficiency, Swiggy said in a statement here. This comes close on the heels of the $35 million (nearly Rs 232.85 crore) it raised in January 2016 from existing and new investors, including New York-based Harmony Partners and Singapore-based RB. With this latest round of funding, the company has now raised $75.5 million (nearly Rs 502.28 crore) in all, it said. "Our strong...
Burger Singh Raises $800000 Funding From Actor Rannvijay Singh & Others
FUNDING

Burger Singh Raises $800000 Funding From Actor Rannvijay Singh & Others

Tipping Mr Pink, which runs fusion burger chain Burger Singh, has received a funding of USD 800,000 from investors like Beer Cafe founder Rahul Singh, Dheeraj Jain (Redcliffe Capital) and television actor Rannvijay Singh. This is in addition to the USD 200,000 funding raised months back from these investors, taking the total raised amount to USD 1 million (about Rs 6.6 crore) this year. Other investors include Ashvin Chadda, Capt Salim Sheikh (ex -Sayaji Hotels) and Avtar Monga (COO of IDFC Bank). "We will use the funds to expand our retail presence. We currently have eight stores and by September next year, we should have 26 stores that will be a mix of company-owned and franchise-owned, company-operated models," Burger Singh CEO Kabir Jeet Singh said. Unlike its rivals, Bu...
Decoding: Why Food Tech Startups Are Not Successful in India?
Story

Decoding: Why Food Tech Startups Are Not Successful in India?

Last year before Diwali we covered an interview of  a 25-year-old Bikaneri sweet shop owner from Noida "What kind of Startup Services a “Bikaneri Sweet Shop” Owner Needs?". Here we mentioned each and every point of a sweet shop owner needs from food tech startups. Though after a gap of one year we still feel that none of the food tech startups taking a lesson from it. Due to lack of perfect business model and strategy, most of the shop owners stop using online food services.   Reasons Why Businesses Had to Scale Down Indian market is not mature enough to order food online. They only order food when there is a discount. Sad but true. We saw 100–150 orders from the single restaurant just for dinner on weekends when foodpanda was running a discount. Immediate next week when foodpand...
Dalitfoods.com: A Website For Pure Dalit Foods
Story

Dalitfoods.com: A Website For Pure Dalit Foods

When was the last time you visited a restaurant with all Dalit chefs? Or picked up a cookery book with authentic recipes of Dalit cuisines? Or even bought a masala unique to Dalit recipes? Possibly never. For that matter, what counts as ‘Dalit food’ to begin with, you may ask. Not very surprisingly, the omniscient Google would be of little help here. Type ‘Brahmin recipes’ on the search bar, and you’ll be deluged with options, each sounding more tempting than the other. But type ‘Dalit recipes’, and suddenly Google Baba is as blank as the rest of the country. It is this invisible character of Dalit food that Dalit entrepreneur and adviser to the Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Chandrabhan Prasad, is seeking to address through his new e-commerce venture dalitfoods.com whi...
IRCTC Tie-Up With Defence Food Research For Better Food Quality in Trains
News

IRCTC Tie-Up With Defence Food Research For Better Food Quality in Trains

Seeking to upgrade its catering operations, Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) today signed an agreement with the Defence Food Research Laboratory (DFRL) here for transfer of technology in food and beverage processing and packaging. Under the agreement, DFRL, a Defence Ministry establishment under Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), will transfer the technical know how and testing for quality assurance to IRCTCs ready-to-eat packaged food for the rail travelers. The Licensing Agreement for Transfer of Technology (ToT) was initiated by IRCTC Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) A K Manocha and DFRL Director Rakesh Kumar Sharma, an IRCTC release said. "IRCTC has been taking several new initiatives to upgrade, professionalise and standardize its cat...
Infographic: How Domino’s is Winning The Pizza War In India
Story

Infographic: How Domino’s is Winning The Pizza War In India

Domino's Pizza in India is dominating the market. With a  70% share of the pizza market and 16% share of the total QSR (Quick Serve Restaurants) market they are clearly in first place. India's QSR market may reach Rs 25k in the next 5 years. Studying how Domino's has internationalized for the India is an MBA case study being written daily. In this article you will see why they are winning:   1. Centralized Management Domino's in India is run by Jubilant food works as a master franchise (source). This single owner concept is a big reason for speed & success. In other countries, Domino's has many different store owners that need communication from corporate. In India, corporate communicates only to Jubilant. They have been able to plan and execute with complete cont...
McDonald’s Going To Auction China, HK stores, Could Fetch Up to $3 Billion Deal
CHINA

McDonald’s Going To Auction China, HK stores, Could Fetch Up to $3 Billion Deal

McDonald's has received more than half a dozen bids for its China and Hong Kong stores, including offers from Beijing Tourism Group, Sanpower and ChemChina, in an auction that could fetch up to $3 billion, people familiar with the matter said. Buyout firms including Bain Capital, TPG Capital and Carlyle Group are also participating in the auction with a view to teaming up with Chinese strategic bidders, the people said. "Given the difficulties Western chains have had recently with public perception, local players have become a serious competitive threat," said Elizabeth Friend, consumer foodservice analyst at Euromonitor International. Oak Brook, Illinois-based McDonald's has hired Morgan Stanley to run the sale of about 2,800 restaurants in China, Hong Kong and South Korea, Reute...
McDonalds May Shift Some Jobs to India in Cost-Cutting Move
News

McDonalds May Shift Some Jobs to India in Cost-Cutting Move

Fast food giant McDonalds may be planning to outsource jobs to India as part of a USD 500 million cost reduction plan it announced last November, a media report said. A report said McDonalds is shedding jobs as part of a USD 500 million cost reduction spearheaded by Chief Executive Steve Easterbrook. "McDonald is also moving some functions to India in what could be a larger controversial push toward outsourcing," it quoted sources familiar with the company's plans as saying. A regional office in Columbus, Ohio is among the first casualties of the cost-cutting. McDonalds described the facility's closing as part of "plans to permanently restructure its operations and eliminate a number of roles," in a May 13 letter the company sent to city officials. The layoffs will begin in ...
Mumbai Based OrderZapp Goes Eco-Friendly; Starts Electric Bikes Delivery
News

Mumbai Based OrderZapp Goes Eco-Friendly; Starts Electric Bikes Delivery

OrderZapp, a recently launched app which offers traditional snacks across Mumbai is taking multiple initiatives to support environmental causes and concerns. The company will initiate its delivering via electric bikes across Mumbai. The idea behind using electric bikes is not limited to support only the environment, but it also helps the start-up manage its operational costs. By taking this step, the company will provide vehicles to the delivery boys, who will now not have to use their own bikes. Along with this, OrderZapp also kick starts tree plantations drive in the drought struck areas of Maharashtra. The drive which begins from Sunday will go on across the months of monsoons. "We are very glad to implement these environment friendly initiatives in our organization. These ...