About Zomato:

In 2008, Deepinder Goyal and Pankaj Chaddah established Zomato. This tech startup is an Indian restaurant search and discovery service. Currently, Zomato operates in twenty-four countries providing information and reviews of restaurants. The images of menus and location of restaurants are depicted on the website. Zomato offers its online delivery services.

 

History Of Zomato:

Earlier, the search and discovery platform commenced its operation under the name – “Foodiebay”. This brand was renamed to “Zomato” around November 2010. Zomato began its business in Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune and Kolkata around 2011. Zomato launched zomato.com to show details on food restaurant and guide.  

 

Overseas Expansion:

By September 2012, Zomato extended to United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Sri Lanka, Philippines, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. Around 2013, Zomato was established in Brazil, Indonesia New Zealand, and Turkey. In 2014, Zomato was launched in Canada, Lebanon, Ireland, and Portugal. The available apps and websites are in various languages – Brazilian, English, Indonesian, Portuguese, and Turkish.  After acquiring Seattle-based food portal, Urbanspoon, Zomato commenced business in the USA, Canada, and Australia. Zomato’s direct competitors became Yelp, Zagat, and OpenTable.

 

Cloud Kitchen:

Using a Company’s blog, Zomato explained the concept of cloud kitchen around February 2017. Zomato showed how it would help restaurants to show their presence without gaining fixed expenses.

 

Zomato’s success:

Zomato claimed to be profitable in 24 countries where it operates. Also, Zomato announced to be “zero commission model” for partner restaurants.  Zomato has acquired 12 startups globally.

 

Around October 2018, Zomato raised $210 million from Ant Financial, payment of Alibaba. Ant Financial had received an ownership stake of over 10% of the Company.  This was as part of the round that valued Zomato at $2 billion. Earlier in 2018, Zomato had raised an additional $150 million from Ant Financial.

 

Drawbacks of Zomato:

Over 500 small to medium-sized restaurants filed an online petition in January 2019. These petitions were to the Competition Commission of India (CCI) and the Prime Minister's Office (PMO). This group complained that online food delivery Companies misuse a dominant market position. Zomato along with FoofPanda, Swiggy, and Uber Eats use discounts, in-house kitchens, and internal sources. As a result, small restaurants were losing business or getting wiped out.  

 

Widest Gender Pay Gaps Amongst Zomato Employees:

Zomato is India’s most well-known technology startup online food delivery services. Last week, it was brought to light that Zomato had the widest gender pay gaps in the world.  According to this statement, the men employees of Zomato had better take-home pay than the women employees.

 

Zomato, the food delivery operator, would offer men paid parental leave of 6 months. This is the same amount of legally paid holiday women get when they have children. Deepinder Goyal, Chief Executive Officer, has observed. The unequal parental leave policy amongst men and women leads to women lacking in leadership positions. Women are expected to provide primary care-giving to their offspring. As a result, there is enmity with half the workforce.   

 

Last year, the Indian government has made it mandatory to allow women 26 weeks of paid maternity leave. This is one of the most progressive policies in the world. Moreover, this policy has caused concerns that competitive business industries would be discouraged to hire women. According to one survey, it estimates as many as 1.8 million job losses.

 

Unequal Hourly Wages:  

Both men and women enjoy the same number of a paid paternal holiday. However, working women are penalized and paid less hourly wages than men.  In India, there is a large difference in average hourly wages earned between men and women. This observation is true out of 73 countries in the International Labour Organisation’s Global Wage Report 2018/19. According to this report, the hourly wage pays the gap between men and women is more than double the global average at 34.5%.

 

Zomato sets an example:

The high profile set by Zomato would bring more attention to promptly resolve any issues. Other established Companies can be positively inspired by strategies taken by Zomato. Those Companies might choose to follow better parental care benefits.  

Vidisha Mishra, an associate fellow at Observer Research Foundation, a think-tank in New Delhi, added. Sooner or later there would be other Companies would follow Zomato. However, it should be understood that paid parental leave does not mean that men would take them. However, it might have an impact on the gender pay gap that would influence the dominant organization and culture.