Indian fast commerce startup Zepto has unveiled plans for an IPO that could be valued at around $1 billion, putting one of Y Combinator’s biggest bets outside the United States on the path to the public markets.
THE depositreleased Monday, offers a rare glimpse into how one of India’s most closely watched startups plans to maintain its meteoric growth after listing. Zepto’s advertising revenue grew more than 151% year-over-year to ₹16.4 billion (approximately $171 million) in fiscal 2026, outpacing the company’s 104% increase in operating revenue to ₹115.5 billion (approximately $2.4 billion).
Although food deliveries remain Zepto’s core business, the faster growth of its advertising arm portends a broader shift in how the startup makes money – a strategy pioneered by Amazon, transforming its marketplace into one of the world’s largest. profitable advertising companies by selling visibility to the same competing merchants on its platform.
Founded in 2021 by Stanford dropouts Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, Zepto has become one of India’s fastest-growing startups, competing with Zomato-owned Blinkit and Swiggy’s Instamart in the country’s hotly contested fast-commerce market. Flipkart, backed by Amazon and Walmart, also intensified their efforts in the segment in recent months.
Despite the intense competition, Zepto continued to rapidly increase its customers and orders. The startup processed more than 640 million orders in fiscal 2026, according to the draft prospectus, nearly double the previous year, while the number of users transacting annually rose to nearly 48 million. Even as the company expanded its network to 1,139 stores, orders per store continued to increase, suggesting that demand is growing along with its footprint.
This growth, however, comes at a cost. Zepto remains loss-making, reporting a net loss of ₹59.1 billion (about $617.36 million) in fiscal 2026, compared to ₹47.0 billion (about $492.45 million) a year earlier. The startup acknowledged in its filing that it may continue to incur losses and be unable to maintain its historic growth rates, a standard but telling disclosure that highlights the tension faced by venture capital-backed companies seeking investors in the public market before reaching profitability.
Zepto plans to raise up to ₹80.1 billion (approximately $837.41 million) through a fresh issue of shares. The IPO will also include an offer for sale of up to 113.5 million shares by existing investors including Nexus Venture Partners, Contrary and Razor Ventures, with the final sale amount dependent on the eventual offering price. The startup also said it could raise up to ₹16.02 billion (around $167 million) from investors in a pre-IPO placement before listing.
The listing is expected to provide a result closely watched by some of Zepto’s early backers. The startup was valued at $7 billion in its latest funding round in October and counts Y Combinator, Lachy Groom, Nexus Venture Partners, StepStone, Glade Brook and Lightspeed among its investors.
Several high-profile shareholders – including Y Combinator-affiliated funds Lightspeed, StepStone, Groom and Glade Brook – are not participating in the IPO’s offer for sale, choosing to retain their stakes as the startup prepares for its market debut. It’s worth pausing: Zepto’s valuation in the public market remains uncertain, and some mutual funds and family offices that looked at the company before the IPO reported valuations much lower than its last private funding round, according to people familiar with the matter.
Zepto’s founders, the filing reveals, received summons in April from India’s anti-money laundering agency, the Enforcement Directorate, seeking information relating to foreign investments, the company’s shareholder structure and other matters under the country’s foreign exchange laws.
The two men then appeared before the agency and provided the requested information and documents. Zepto said it had not received any further communication from the regulator since, but warned it could not rule out future inquiries, investigations or sanctions.
The proposed listing marks the culmination of a years-long effort to prepare the startup for its domestic market debut. Zepto moved his legal domicile from Singapore to India last yearjoining a growing number of startups restructuring their holding companies as local public markets become increasingly attractive for tech listings.
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Jagmeet covers startups, technology policy updates and all other major technology developments in India for TechCrunch. He previously worked as a senior correspondent at NDTV.
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