This conversation took place sometime around Mar/Apr-15 not sure about exact time
Analyst Friend (AF) – So which company you looking at?
Me – Info Edge
AF – what’s so good about it apart from Naukri.com, that’s only cashcow.
Me – true, rest all are loss making
AF – exactly my point, why to look at it?
Me – zomato seems interesting play, info edge has 50% stake (now it’s down post raising new capital)
AF – ya true, but have you seen FoodPanda? They are giving huge competition to them.
Me – not exactly, given zomato is only restaurant listing and FoodPanda is into delivering of food.
AF – ya but you need menu for ordering & delivering which ideal should have been done by zomato and they seem to have missed the bus.
Me – Naah…I don’t think so…they are moving slowly and steady…they can launch it tomm as they already have relationship with restaurants.
AF – then why have they not launched it yet?
Me – there are challenges with that business, have a look at this – Food Panda or Fool Panda , I think their systems are not in place and zomato is still working on it or has willfully chosen to ignore it. They are bunch of smart guys just check out back ground of founders – Link here.
AF – what challenges are you talking about?
Me – how to confirm delivery of order? Making sure none of the party is lying or faking?
AF – hmm….true…I will wait and watch how this space develops
Me – same here, it looks interesting, let see.
So this is pretty amazing, MINT newspaper (The BEST Newspaper in the town) has put out a story on Foodpanda.com and scam carried on by company insider. Here is link , article is long but very insightful, hence make sure you read it and give full attention.
If you are planning to be Analyst/Investor/Fund manager make sure you develop a good reading habit, from variety of sources. Most of the analyst & related fraternity would have glued their eye on pink newspaper & magazine and would have missed one isolate incident (Food Panda or Fool Panda ) that gave me signal there is probably something wrong with FoodPanda or help me wonder why is Zomato not doing it?