Swiggy Looks Beyond Food And Groceries, Enters Sports Market

Swiggy has launched Swiggy Sports Private Limited, a fully owned subsidiary, after getting approval from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs on January 15, 2025.

This marks the company’s entry into the sports sector.The new subsidiary will focus on owning sports teams, developing talent, organizing events, managing facilities, broadcasting and securing sponsorships. Its aim is to create business models that support and promote sports.

Swiggy shared this update during its earnings call for July-September, highlighting the main goals of the new entity. These goals include owning and managing sports teams, developing talent, organizing events, running facilities, offering career services, securing broadcasting and sponsorship rights and promoting sports events using different business models, as stated in its stock exchange filing.

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The creation of Swiggy Sports comes after the company acquired Team Mumbai in November 2023. Team Mumbai was co-founded by former Indian tennis players Gaurav Natekar and Arati Ponnappa Natekar. The team competes in the World Pickleball League (WPBL), India’s first global franchise-based pickleball league. The league's first season will be held from January 24 to February 2, 2025.

Sumant Pradhan, a long-term pickleball enthusiast and senior aviation executive, said, “Swiggy entering this segment would be a significant move, this sport (pickleball) is growing among all age groups and the ripple effect of its popularity in tier-1 cities is slowly being seen in smaller towns as well who are adapting this game. Currently, the segment is fragmented with many operators and a player like Swiggy would formalise the operations for sure.”

Swiggy’s competitor, Zomato, made a similar move in August 2023 by launching District to bring together its dining and ticketing business after buying Paytm’s event ticketing business for Rs 2,048.4 crore.

Swiggy’s exact plan for growing its sports division is not clear yet. However, Rohit Kapoor, Swiggy’s CEO of Food Marketplace, said in December 2023 that Swiggy isn’t entering the sports business in a big way.

This expansion comes as Swiggy shows signs of better financial performance. The company reduced its losses by nearly 5% year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 625.53 crore in the second quarter of FY25, with operating revenue increasing by 30% YoY to Rs 3,601.45 crore.

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