Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra are two boys who dream enough in 2020 and could transform their dream into reality online grocery delivery market with Zepto, Kaivalya Vohra has emerged as the youngest Indian to have a net worth of Rs 1,000 crore, as per revealed IIFL Wealth Hurun India Rich List 2022 and Aadit Palicha, has also made it to the list with a net worth of Rs 1,200 crore in 2020.
Zepto’s brisk commerce business has created a new lesson for entrepreneurs in India. Valued at $900 million, Zepto is now challenging the Big Tech commerce on delivery patterns.
The online grocery delivery business was more apparent after the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to social distance restrictions, people were switching to online food shopping because it is not only practical but also for safety.
Zepto was founded out through their homes during the Covid-19 pandemic. Groceries and other necessities would arrive more than expected due to increased demand for delivery services. Zepto was then developed using all of this knowledge by the young founders.
Zepto is the fastest-growing business and grocery delivery service. Zepto promises to bring groceries in just 10 minutes to your door. But how does the delivery work so quickly? Unlike other grocery delivery services like Swiggy, Instamart, Blinkit, BigBasket, and Amazon Fresh which often take 30 minutes. Let's see more about Zepto.
Zepto
A startup in Mumbai named Zepto provides a 10-minute grocery delivery service at the door. Zepto is a startup founded by Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra that specializes in the quick grocery delivery business.
In 2021, it did more than one million deliveries while collaborating with 86+ owners of dark stores in thirteen different locations in India. Dark storefronts may appear huge, but it's one of the great strategies to manage that have kept some retail establishments and survived during the pandemic.
Dark stores are distribution centers that aren’t accessible to people. These small warehouses efficiently fill orders, giving customers access to resources and choices, including online shopping, same-day delivery, and in-store pickup. Zepto uses its network of “cloud shops” or “micro-warehouses” to complete those orders quickly.
Dark stores, however, can’t handle high sales demand because they’re designed for quick deliveries. They have around a thousand items on display, including the finest deals on fresh vegetables, fruits, milk, meat, and kitchen supplies. Additionally, their AI-powered technologies guarantee a seamless changeover between selecting, packing, and shipping.
Zepto in India is the fastest-growing business in the faster-delivery industry According to the company, the network’s performance has improved due to the use of location, geography, population, road patterns, traffic dynamics, weather, last-mile supply availability, real estate values, and other many factors and its currently operates over 40 dark stores across India.
Zepto currently records monthly average revenue of $12 million, but spends about $8 million in marketing, promotion, and other activities like free deliveries each month, Reuters reported.
A brief history of Zepto's founders
Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, two 19 years old kids, who are childhood friends, founded Zepto after leaving Stanford University’s computer science department came back to their home town in India and launched a business.
Kaivalya Vohra
Kaivalya is the youngest among the richest Indians. He is a co-founder and chief technology officer of both Zepto and KiranaKart. He attended Y Combinator with his co-founder Aadit and got his Bachelor’s degree in computer science from Stanford University. Kaivalya is ranked 1036th with a net worth of ₹ 1,000 crores on the Hurun list.
Aadit Palicha
The CEO and Co-Founder of both Zepto and KiranaKart are Aadit Palicha. Completed a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science at Stanford University and then earned an IB diploma in Mathematics and Computer Science from GEMS Education. At the age of 17, He launched GoPool, his first business.
In April 2020, he quit the business and started KiranaKart and Zepto. Aadit Palicha is ranked 950 and has a net worth of ₹ 1,200 crores in 2021. He was also featured in Forbes magazine's influential "30 under 30 (Asia list)” in the e-commerce section.
The Vohra and Palicha entrepreneurs are the youngest start-up founders in the Hurun India Future Unicorn Index 2022. Including in the list of India's richest indicates the growing influence of the country's startups.
Zepto - Future Plans
The firm is going to increase the number of dark stores in other locations, going to hire more employees and work with more new clients as well. By the end of 2022, it predicts that 100 dark businesses open, serving around 100 pin codes. According to a research group, it's also predicted to reach $300 million by the end of this year and will expand to $5 billion by 2025.
KiranaKart is the first startup
KiranaKart was an online grocery delivery startup. The hyperlocal delivery startup has partnered with general stores from Borivali to Colaba, selling everything from loose dal to imported products as well.
It was started in June 2020 and in March 2021 it got shut down by the founders KiranaKart aims to expand its 45-minute grocery delivery service across Mumbai, and grow aggressively in the city before expanding to other cities in India. It expects to make the first 1,50,000 deliveries at a delivery cost of Rupee 1.
We couldn't find a strong product-market fit with KiranaKart, so Kaivalya and I shut down operations and started Zepto.
Summary
Kaivalya Vohra, the co-founder of quick grocery delivery app Zepto has managed in the Rs 1,000-crore net worth lists. Zepto launched a commerce service that was founded in April 2021. It operates out of a network of ‘cloud stores’ or micro-warehouses to fulfil orders within the time frame of 10 minutes.
These stores, also known as dark stores, through which orders can be delivered faster. It has over 1,000 employees and delivers over 3,000 products, from fresh fruits and vegetables, to daily cooking essentials, etc., to Indian homes within 10 minutes. The quick commerce startup's valuation hit $900 million at the start of 2022.
FAQ's:
20-year-old Aadit Palicha is CEO of Zepto.
Delivery platforms Zepto and Blinkit promise to offer delivery of essential groceries within 10 mins of placing an order. Whereas, Dunzo promises to offer to deliver groceries between 19 mins to 29 mins.
Palicha said that the company has been taking more than a million orders a week for some time now, with daily orders in the average range of 1.5-3 lakh a day.
