Cloud kitchens major Rebel Foods ups stakes in FoodyBuddy, DropKaffe

Cloud kitchen company Rebel Foods has infused another round of capital into home chef-focussed FoodyBuddy Applications and online beverages company DropKaffe Food and Beverages.

Rebel Foods invested $680,000 (Rs 5 crore) into Bengaluru-based FoodyBuddy to acquire an additional 16% stake in the company, according to regulatory filings. Sequoia Capital, Goldman Sachs and Coatue-backed Rebel Foods first invested in FoodyBuddy in December last year. The latest transaction that valued FoodyBuddy at Rs 31 crore takes Rebel Foods’ ownership in the company to 26%.

FoodyBuddy previously raised a total of $1.87 million from early stage venture fund Prime Venture Partners.

Founded by Akil Sethuraman, Anup Gopinath and Rachna Rao in 2015, the platform aggregates home chefs and creates demand in their local community. Its Android app has over one lakh downloads.

DropKaffe, which operates online beverage delivery services within Bengaluru, has received a fresh infusion of Rs 4 crore (about $546,000) from Rebel Foods.

The latest funding comes about a year after Rebel announced a $4.9 million round in the company.

DropKaffe previously raised $2.3 million from institutional investors and angel investors between 2015 and 2017, according to VCCEdge data.

According to filings, the latest infusion takes Rebel Foods' stake in DropKaffe to 42%.

In 2015, the company had raised $300,000 in a seed funding round from angel investor Manish Singhal and US-based venture capital firm P39 Capital.

Founded in 2015 by Rakshit Kejriwal and DLV Subba, the firm manufactures and sells milk-based beverages under the brand name of Goodness. It offers coffee, cold coffees and bottled dairy beverages including milkshakes and smoothies.

Founded in 2011 by Jaydeep Barman and Kallol Banerjee, Rebel Foods, formerly known as Faasos Food Services, owns and operates 15 cloud kitchen brands such as Faasos, Ovenstory Pizza, Behrouz Biryani, Lunch Box and The Good Bowl. With 325 cloud kitchens, the company has operations in India, UAE, Indonesia, and the UK.

In its most recent fundraising, Rebel Foods secured nearly $50 million from returning investor, technology focussed hedge fund Coatue Management.