Zomato raises $37 mn from Sequoia Capital and Info Edge

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Zomato, the popular restaurant search service, has announced a fresh round of funding of USD 37 million from Sequoia Capital and existing investors Info Edge.

This takes Zomato's total funding to over USD 53 million; Zomato had earlier raised USD 16.5 million from Info Edge over four rounds of funding.

With new round of funding, Zomato aims to develop a product that will change the way people look for restaurant recommendations around them.

"This is an exciting phase for us. We believe that we can disrupt restaurant search with our rich content-driven model. We are excited to partner with Sequoia Capital as our venture partner to help us succeed internationally, and we can look forward to seeing Zomato in many more countries over the next couple of years," said Deepinder Goyal, founder and CEO of Zomato.

Zomato was started by IIT Delhi alumni in July 2008 for Delhi NCR and has expanded its services over a span of 5 years to 35 cities in 11 countries and employs over 600 people.

"At Sequoia Capital, we have been championing the cause of Indian companies globalizing at a rapid pace. Many of our services and enterprise software investments are already global category leaders. Zomato is the first Indian consumer internet company to build a significant international footprint, and we have made this investment because of our strong conviction in the founders, the world-class product they've built, and their ambitious global vision," said Mohit Bhatnagar, MD, Sequoia Capital India Advisors.

Zomato has also announced the launch of its services in three new countries - Brazil, Turkey, and Indonesia.

In addition to these, Zomato has also expanded its services within UK from three cities to five, with the inclusion of Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Sanjeev Bikhchandani, founder of Info Edge said, "Zomato is one of the finest consumer Internet businesses to come out of India. It has a great team, excellent revenue scale-up with a known path to profit, and a global opportunity. We are excited to partner with them to build a world-class restaurant search engine."

Zomato believes that menus, pictures, and maps are as important as reviews when it comes down to a customer's decision-making process about where to eat. It follows a rich-content approach to restaurant search, and has a team that collects menu cards, clicks pictures and gets mapping information on its own.