Zomato enters the events space by launching Zomato Events

Zomato, an online food ordering and restaurant reservation platform, has launched Zomato Events, foraying into the growing events space. This is the first time for Info Edge, Sequoia Capital and Ant Financial-backed venture to enter the burgeoning events space.

Hospitality chains OYO and Treebo are among the other major Indian consumer internet startups that have forayed into the events space recently.

Gaurav Gupta, Chief Operating Officer of Zomato, said, "At Zomato, given our focus on food, we tend to think of ourselves as a food company, and not just a food-tech company. We fundamentally believe that that the restaurant channel or the out-of-home food cooking theme will be dominant as well, and we are trying to grow that as much as we can."

Under the Zomato Events, the company is introducing a multi-city food carnival 'Zomaland', which will have street performances, pop-up restaurants and food exhibitions, among others. Globally, the Events vertical will be led by Chaitanya Mathur, former Co-Founder of Grub Fest.

"The idea behind doing this is that if there is a food experience that needs to be brought to the user, even if it’s an offline one, we should be the ones bringing it to the consumer. We want consumers to have a great experience with food offline as well," Gupta added.