BENGALURU: Reliance Retail and Google-backed quick commerce company Dunzo has deferred June month salary to many employees and according to sources, the start-up might go for another round of layoffs. Though Dunzo did not comment on this, sources said the top management has been the most affected and that the start-up is facing a cash crunch.
It fired 3% of its workforce or 80 employees in January and again another 30% in April to cut costs and also streamline the start-up’s operations. It was reported that Dunzo has been looking at its team structures and network designs to build efficiency in teams.
Dunzo raised $75 million via convertible notes in April, and it had reduced its dark store count by about 50%. “As we scale from 10 to 100, we are continuously learning how to redefine business processes at scale. Any decision that impacts people is tough, and always our last option,” Kabeer Biswas, CEO & co-founder, Dunzo, had said. Founded in 2015, the start-up has so far raised $497 million and employs over 1,00 people. It was valued at $757 million in May 2022.
Backed by Google, Blume Ventures, Alteria Capital and Lightrock, among others, as per Tracxn, Reliance Retail holds 25.6% stake in the company, followed by Google at 18.53%. Dunzo competes with Swiggy, Zepto and Blinkit, among others. As per Statista, revenue in the online food delivery market in India is projected to reach $34.68 billion in 2023, and the grocery delivery segment is expected to show a revenue growth of 36.1% in 2024.