Oyo wants a bite of foodtech, may acquire Freshmenu: Report

• The reported acquisition of Freshmenu could happen for $60 million.
  
• Oyo and Freshmenu have a common investor – Lightspeed Venture Partners.
  
• The hospitality unicorn has big dreams – it wants to become the world’s largest hotel chain in two years.
  

Indian hospitality unicorn Oyo Rooms is reportedly looking at venturing into foodtech by acquiring cloud kitchen startup Freshmenu.

The acquisition, which could be valued at $50-60 million according to ETtech, will mark Oyo’s entry in the food space.

Freshmenu, as a cloud kitchen startup (accepts only online delivery), has its own kitchens and delivery.

Since its launch in 2014, the startup has gone on to have over 27 kitchens across Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi. In November, ETtech reported that Freshmenu had seen a jump in its revenues to 72% at ₹122.3 crore in FY18 compared with ₹71 crore in FY17.

Oyo and Freshmenu have a common investor – Lightspeed Venture Partners – and reportedly, it is Lightspeed that has brought the two startups together.

Oyo Rooms has big ambitions – it wants to become the world’s biggest hotel chain in the next two years. Introducing F&B services will help the hospitality chain to offer more to its consumers.

Meanwhile, Freshmenu works with Zomato and Swiggy and receives most of its orders from the two platforms.

The hospitality startup Oyo had turned into a unicorn in 2018 after it received a funding of $800 million at a valuation of $5 billion. It has also made a mark globally in China, Saudi Arabia, Dubai and is even considering entering the big league with its entry into the US markets. In China, it become one of the top 10 hotel chains in just one year of operations.

“Globally, we have reached over 4,58,000 fully controlled leased and franchised keys (rooms) with a realised value run rate of $1.8 billion,” said its CFO Abhishek Gupta to Financial Express.

See Also:
A 6-year-old Indian startup wants to be world’s biggest hotel chain

OYO Rooms is the most valuable “hotel chain” in South Asia after Softbank investment

This 24-year-old dropped out of college, won funding from Peter Thiel, then raised $480 million for his startup