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Google-backed Dunzo raises $45M to expand its hyperlocal delivery startup in India

An Indian startup that is increasingly posing a threat to established food and grocery delivery businesses and e-commerce giants just closed a new financing round to expand its business in the nation. Bangalore-based Dunzo said today it has raised $45 million from Google, Lightbox, STIC Ventures, and 3L Capital. The new financing round — dubbed […]

An Indian startup that is increasingly posing a threat to established food and grocery delivery businesses and e-commerce giants just closed a new financing round to expand its business in the nation.

Bangalore-based Dunzo said today it has raised $45 million from Google, Lightbox, STIC Ventures, and 3L Capital. The new financing round — dubbed Series D — valued the four-year-old startup at about $200 million, three people familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. The startup has raised $81 million to date.

Dunzo operates an eponymous hyper-local delivery service. Users get access to a wide-range of items from grocery, perishables, pet supplies, medicines to dinner from their neighborhood stores and restaurants.

But that’s not all. You can have Dunzo pick up and deliver anything in a city. Forgot your laptop charger at home? Dunzo can take care of it. Part of the service’s charm is that its delivery is fast (most of its deliveries take under 25 minutes) and as long as the store is not very far away, it’s not going to cost you more than a $1.

Dunzo is currently operational in eight Indian cities: Bangalore, Delhi, Noida, Pune, Gurgaon, Powai, Hyderabad, and Chennai. The startup said it will use the fresh capital to expand its technology infrastructure and develop partnerships with small and medium businesses.

dunzo hq techcrunch

Dunzo founders told TechCrunch that food category already accounts for a quarter of all deliveries the service processes. As the service scales, it is increasingly becoming a competitor to food delivery startups such as BigBasket, Swiggy, and Zomato.

In recent months, Dunzo has also started to test delivery of smartphones and other products. The startup recently quietly began to deliver Xiaomi smartphones to users in select parts of India. Unlike Amazon or Flipkart, that take a day or two to deliver an item, Dunzo was getting the new phones to users in 30 minutes. Dunzo has tested a similar partnership with Puma, executives told TechCrunch.

In an interesting turn of events, last month Swiggy announced Go, a service that allows users in select cities in India to deliver any kind of product — not just food, thereby entering Dunzo’s territory.

More to follow shortly…

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