Zomato Brings Back Two Senior Executives To Scale Up Its Going-Out Biz

Zomato has reportedly brought back two senior executives to ramp up its Going-Out business amid the foodtech major’s discussions with Paytm to acquire its movie ticketing and events business.

The company has brought back Rahul Ganjoo and Pradyot Ghate, who left the company last year, Moneycontrol reported.

Ganjoo joined Zomato in 2017 and became its Co-CEO after three years, as well as the head of new initiatives in August 2022. 

He put down his papers in November and left the company in January 2023. Since then, Ganjoo has been serving as an advisor to a US-based GenAI conversation intelligence platform observer.ai., a position he has held since 2016. 

Ghate’s engagement with the foodtech major was similar to Ganjoo. After joining the company in 2014 as an associate vice president- growth, Ghate was elevated to VP role during his nine-year long stint. He left the company in July 2023, citing a career break.

According to the report, the company has asked both of them to incubate new ideas for its Going-Out business.

“Both of them are pursuing 0-1 ideas in the going-out business… which is closer to dining out, lifestyle and entertainment than the core food delivery segment. But, things change very quickly in Zomato. There’s no guarantee that what they are working on will eventually be launched,” a source was quoted as saying by the publication.

Inc42 has reached out to the company for a comment on the development. The story will be updated based on the response.

This comes shortly after it was reported that the company is looking to bolster its live entertainment and ticketing vertical with the acquisition of Paytm Insider for a speculated INR 1,500 Cr. 

While Zomato’s Going-Out business was instituted in 2018 and oversees IPs like Zomaland, it contributes in only single digits to the foodtech major’s overall business. For instance, it only brought in a revenue of INR 93 Cr in the quarter ending on March 31, 2024. 

Shortly after the companies acknowledged the talks, brokerage firm JM Financial said that acquisition of Paytm’s ticketing business will strengthen Zomato’s ‘Going-out’ business. “The deal could catapult Zomato to second position in the events & movie ticketing space, behind only BookMyShow,” it observed. 

Besides the experimentation with this vertical, the company is also aggressively expanding services under its other verticals. Recently, it introduced a restaurant services hub, large order fleet, last mile deliveries for office goers, priority deliveries in a pilot phase, and Zomato Everyday,, within this year. 

The company’s shares were trading at INR 209.05 at 3:40 PM on July 2, up 1.81% from previous close.