Zomato plans complete transition to electric vehicles by 2030

IPO-bound food technology company Zomato plans to switch completely to electric vehicles for its delivery fleet by 2030.  

The company, according to a blog post, is working with players in the electric vehicle space, including vehicle and battery manufacturers as well as the government to work on business models to speed up the adoption.

To achieve its EV goals, Zomato has joined international non-profit, The Climate Group’s EV100 programme, CEO Deepinder Goyal said.  As part of the programme, companies pledge to transition delivery fleets to electric vehicles, apart from providing charging infrastructure for staff and customers by 2030.  

Other members of the programme from India are mobility company Bounce and ecommerce giant Flipkart.  

The food aggregator already uses EVs to deliver orders in Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru, however, the number of such deliveries is a fraction of its nationwide business.  

“At the moment, the adoption rate is very low for us and for the two-wheeler industry in general. We believe key barriers that currently impact adoption include limited battery range, lack of charging infrastructure, higher upfront costs and lack of trust in new technology,” Goyal in his post.

“We are already actively working with a few EV players to design pilots and create business models that could facilitate a faster transition towards a viable mobility solution for deliveries,” he added.  

Gurugram headquartered Zomato is poised to raise Rs 8,250 crore through its public market offering. The company also said that it might consider a private placement of equity shares aggregating Rs 1,500 crore prior to filing the prospectus with the Registrar of Companies.

The company recorded Gross order Volume (GOV) of 403.1 million during financial year 2019-20, according to its Draft Red Herring Prospectus filed in April.