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Info Edge (India) Ltd has committed to invest Rs. 13.5 crore ($3 Million) in Zomato.com, one of the largest online food and lifestyle guides of India. This announcement for Zomato comes about a year after raising the first round of Rs. 4.7 Cr ($1 Million) in August 2010 to fund Zomato.com’s (then Foodiebay.com) product development, sales and marketing efforts. Zomato.com has since seen strong overall growth.

Speaking about Zomato, Info Edge Founder and Executive Vice Chairman, Sanjeev Bhikhchandani says, "Zomato.com is one of India’s fastest growing consumer internet portals. The satisfaction levels on both sides of the value chain (consumer and merchant) are very high – a testimony to the great product made for the consumers and the value seen in it by the merchants. We see immense potential in their current model, in their future plans and the capability of the team to execute it well."

Zomato.com is 3 years old and currently caters to 10 cities in India – Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Jaipur and Chandigarh. The website provides in-depth information about restaurants and events (e.g. menu cards, contact details, pictures, directions, rating and reviews) to its users helping them make a well informed decision.

Zomato.com will use the investment to further scale up operations to drive both its existing and new verticals and increase its brand visibility. Deepinder Goyal, Founder and CEO of Zomato.com says, “We plan to use these funds to further scale our operations, enrich user experience on both our web and mobile products, and increase our reach in the market. We have recently moved into events and an e-commerce section is in the pipeline. The second round of funding will also go into building a strong foundation for these new verticals.”

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