What is Zomato? Zomato Review, Features

Founded in 2008, Zomato is a food ordering, takeaway and restaurant search and discovery platform operating in 24 countries around the world (mainly India, Southeast Asia and the Middle East). Zomato is known as the "Indian version of Dianping."

About Zomato

Zomato provides information and reviews about restaurants, including images of menus for restaurants that do not have their own websites, and also offers online food delivery in some countries.

In April 2016, in addition to restaurant display and recommendations, Zomato announced the launch of a restaurant sales system, which is called Zomato Base, a cloud-based restaurant POS system.

Serving the country

Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Lebanon, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Turkey, UAE, UK, USA.

Security breach incidents

On June 4, 2015, an Indian security researcher hacked into the Zomato website and gained access to information of approximately 62.5 million users. Exploiting the vulnerability, he was able to access users’ personal data such as phone numbers, email addresses, and private Instagram photos through Instagram access tokens. Zomato resolved the issue within 48 hours of it becoming apparent.

On May 18, 2017, a security blog called Hackread claimed to have compromised more than 17 million accounts. The post by Hackread said: "The database includes emails and password hashes of Zomato users, and the price of the whole package is $1,001.43 (BTC 0.5587). The vendor also shared a large amount of sample data to prove that it is legitimate." Hackread claimed to have sold the details of 17 million users on the Dark Web. Zomato confirmed that the names, email addresses and encrypted passwords were from its database, but the company assured affected customers that no payment information or credit card details were stolen.

Development History

-In 2008, this restaurant search and discovery platform started operations under the name Foodiebay.

-In November 2010, the brand was renamed Zomato.

-In 2011, Zomato was launched in Bengaluru, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad.

-In September 2012, Zomato expanded overseas to the United Arab Emirates, Sri Lanka, Qatar, the United Kingdom, the Philippines and South Africa in the Middle East.

- In 2013, Zomato launched its website and app in New Zealand, Turkey, Brazil and Indonesia in languages ​​including Turkish, Brazilian Portuguese, Indonesian and English.

-In November 2013, Zomato received another US$37 million in funding from American venture capital giant Sequoia Capital.

- In April 2014, Zomato launched its services in Portugal and in the same year in Canada, Lebanon and Ireland.

-In July 2014, it acquired MenuMania, a New Zealand-based restaurant search service company, for an undisclosed amount.

-In August 2014, Zomato acquired Lunchtime.cz in the Czech Republic and Obedovat.sk in Slovakia to expand its presence in Europe.

-In September 2014, Zomato acquired Polish restaurant search service Gastronauci for an undisclosed amount.

-In December 2014, Zomato acquired Italian restaurant search service Cibando.

- In January 2015, Zomato acquired Türkiye’s Mekanist. The price was not disclosed but it was confirmed to be an all-cash deal.

-In January 2015, Zomato acquired Seattle-based food portal Urbanspoon.

-In April 2015, Zomato acquired MapleGraph Solutions.

-In April 2015, Zomato completed its Series F financing of 5 million euros, with investors including InfoEdge, Sequoia Capital and VY Capital.

-In September 2015, Zpmato received US$60 million in Series G funding.

In 2016, the company acquired logistics technology startup Sparse Labs.

-In April 2016, in addition to restaurant display and recommendations, Zomato announced the launch of a restaurant sales system. This feature is called Zomato Base, which is a cloud-based restaurant POS system.

- In February 2017, Zomato explained the concept of cloud kitchens in a company blog. Through cloud kitchens, the company will help restaurants to scale up their business without incurring any fixed costs.

-In June 2017, Zomato acquired food delivery startup Runnr.

-In September 2017, Zomato claimed that it had “achieved profitability” in the 24 countries it currently operates in. In addition, Zomato announced that it would launch a “zero commission model” for partner restaurants.

-In February 2018, Zomato received an investment of US$ 150 million from Alibaba.

-In September 2018, Zomato acquired Bengaluru-based food e-marketplace TongueStun Food in a cash and stock deal for approximately $18 million.

-In October 2018, Ant Financial made a strategic investment of US$210 million in Indian food delivery startup Zomato. After this investment, Zomato's parent company Info Edge's shareholding ratio dropped from 30.91% to 27.68%, and Ant Financial's shareholding ratio will exceed 10%.

-In December 2018, Zomato acquired TechEagle Innovations, a Lucknow-based startup that specializes in working with drones.

-Zomato’s revenue in fiscal year 2018 was US$ 74 million.