Zomato has expanded its food delivery service in partnership with the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), now covering over 100 railway stations across India.
This move marks a major enhancement of their service, allowing train passengers to receive food directly at their train coaches.
Zomato’s founder and CEO, Deepinder Goyal, announced the expansion on social media platform X, stating, “Update: @zomato now delivers food directly to your train coach at over 100 railway stations, thanks to our partnership with @IRCTCofficial. We’ve already served 10 lakh orders on trains. Try it on your next journey!”
The partnership between Zomato and IRCTC began in 2023 with a pilot program at five stations: New Delhi, Prayagraj, Kanpur, Lucknow, and Varanasi.
Since then, the service has grown to include additional locations like Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Goa, Bhopal, and Surat.
This expansion comes amid growing competition in the online food delivery sector.
In March 2024, Swiggy also began offering food delivery on trains through a collaboration with IRCTC, initially covering four stations: Bengaluru, Bhubaneshwar, Visakhapatnam, and Vijayawada.
Swiggy plans to extend its service to 59 more stations in the near future.
Zomato’s increased presence in the food delivery market reflects its broader growth strategy.
At the end of the financial year in March 2024, Zomato had 2.76 lakh restaurant partners on its platform, a significant increase from 61,000 at the end of FY19.
Flush with capital from a substantial increase in its consolidated net profit for Q1 FY25, Zomato has been aggressively expanding its services.
Recent initiatives include the acquisition of Paytm’s movie and event ticketing business for INR 2,048 crore, the launch of a developer platform for point of sale (PoS) partners, and the introduction of features such as ticket reselling, order scheduling, and ‘Zomato for Enterprises’.
Despite these advancements, Zomato’s shares ended 3.87% lower at INR 272.9 apiece on the Bombay Stock Exchange today.
