: overview
The most important numbers in Zepto’s IPO filing are the ones it chose not to report.
Right before asking the public for ₹8,000 crore, it swapped the standard quick-commerce metrics for its own — and underneath the new labels is a company growing fast, losing the most money of the big three in absolute terms, and betting an entire strategy on a basket a third smaller than its rivals’.
The metric switch — the story before the story
Zepto built its DRHP on bespoke KPIs — ATU instead of MTU, NRV instead of NOV, “supply chain costs” instead of contribution margin. None of these are like-for-like with Blinkit or Instamart, and that is not an accident; it is a yellow flag.
Instead of monthly transacting users (MTU), Zepto reports annual transacting users (ATU) — anyone who ordered even once in twelve months — which lets it show 48 million next to Blinkit’s 22 million. But Blinkit’s number is monthly. NRV plays the same move on revenue, folding ad income and fees into a number that looks larger than the clean order value peers report; “supply chain costs” quietly stands in for the contribution-margin line that would show what each order actually earns.
When a company invents its own scorecard right before listing, the useful question isn’t what the new numbers say — it’s that probably comparable were not that flattering.
It’s a basket problem, not a cost problem
Here is what actually decides whether Zepto makes money. In quick commerce, almost every cost — the rider, the picking, the packing — is incurred per order and is roughly fixed regardless of basket size. So the revenue side of each order is everything. And Zepto’s basket is about a third smaller than its rivals’.
That is the “everyday low price” strategy working exactly as designed on the demand side — and punishing the economics on the supply side. Zepto’s variable cost per order (~₹61) is perfectly competitive; it is not operationally sloppy. The problem sits one line up: it keeps just ₹68 of gross profit per order versus Blinkit’s ₹141 — barely half — because the basket is small. Zepto didn’t stumble into this; it engineered it.
Blinkit has already won — the moat is the take rate
Out of every ₹100 of goods sold, Blinkit keeps about ₹26; Zepto and Instamart keep about ₹20. That gap is the whole game, because more kept per order means more cash to open stores, deepen density and pull further ahead.
It shows up where it matters — the bottom line of a single delivery. Blinkit is at breakeven; the other two are still bleeding on every order.
And the uncomfortable scoreboard fact the new metrics soften: in absolute terms, Zepto loses the most of the three — around ₹5,000 crore last year — more than Instamart and far more than Blinkit, which has crossed into profit.
But the trajectory is real — and that’s the bull case
To be fair, the direction of travel is genuinely strong. A year ago Zepto lost about ₹171 on every order; it is now down to ₹59 — a ~65% improvement in five quarters.
The drivers are healthy, not cosmetic. Marketing spend has collapsed from ₹52 to roughly ₹1 per order — customers come back on their own, so acquisition is nearly free. Ad income (brands paying to show up inside the app) grew over 150% and now offsets the thin product margin. And Zepto runs the busiest stores in the industry — ~2,071 orders per day per store versus Blinkit’s ~1,425 — by packing fewer cities very densely. Hold this slope and per-order breakeven is plausibly a few quarters away.
The balance-sheet tell
Of the ₹8,000 crore Zepto wants to raise, about ₹1,730 crore is earmarked to pay rent on dark stores it already runs. That is not growth capital — it is runway to fund the existing loss-making base while it works toward profit. The honest read of the raise is “buy time to breakeven,” not “conquer the market.”
Two footnotes worth holding. On the positive side, Zepto runs a negative working-capital cycle — suppliers effectively fund its day-to-day cash, the same healthy dynamic that powers DMart. On the other, the founders have received summons from the Enforcement Directorate over foreign-exchange rules — a live regulatory overhang on a foreign-owned entity heading into a listing.
The bottom line, distilled to one question: is lowest AOV, highest frequency, deepest density in just 66 cities — a viable path to profit, or a structurally disadvantaged position behind Blinkit's high-AOV, high-take-rate, 200-city model? The bull owns the trajectory (collapsing CAC, scaling ads, throughput leadership, negative WC). The bear owns the structure (thinnest GP/order by design, biggest absolute losses, bespoke metrics, a raise that partly funds the loss base, a 66-city ceiling, and a widening take-rate gap to the winner).
This is a #3 player with the largest losses and non-standard disclosures listing into exactly the IPO window where 64% of IPO Class of 2025 is now underwater. The trajectory could absolutely cross into profit — but the listing is being engineered to be priced on the trajectory, not the current position, which is precisely the "demand at launch ≠ value" setup.
For information and educational purposes only. Prepared by GoIndiaStocks from Zepto’s draft IPO prospectus and the disclosed results of listed peers (Blinkit/Eternal, Instamart/Swiggy). Not investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Figures are company-reported and approximate; peer metrics are restated to a like-for-like basis where disclosure differs. Quick-commerce metrics evolve quarterly and may be revised.