Ola Set To Re-Enter Grocery Delivery Services Via Government-Supported ONDC

New Delhi: Ola, led by Bhavish Aggarwal is set to launch its grocery delivery services through the government supported Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) soon, as reported by Moneycontrol. Ola is the second-largest buyer-side platform in the food category after Magicpin. The company has captured over a third of the market in areas like Bengaluru and Delhi-NCR with 15,000 to 20,000 orders per day.

The grocery delivery venture is not something new for Ola. The ride-hailing startup has launched a standalone online grocery store in Bengaluru after the launch of a food delivery app in March of the same year. Their main aim was to utilise its cabs and drivers to deliver groceries from 9 am to 11 pm. However, nine months later the company shut down both Ola store and Ola Foods without providing details. ()

However, in 2021 Ola made a comeback in the grocery delivery sector with Ola Dash, and launched its services in Mumbai and Bangalore through 15 dark stores. Unfortunately, after a year the ride-hailing startup shut down Ola Dash and discontinued its all dark store operations. ()

ONDC Projects 10M Transactions in June

ONDC is projected to surpass 10 million transactions in June which includes both mobility and retail and marks a fivefold growth year-on-year. In May, the network  reached a new high with five million retail orders up from 3.59 in April. Further, ONDC recorded on all-time high of 200,000 retails transactions in a single day during May, as per resources cited by Moneycontrol.

Over the past year and a half, several new-age companies like Paytm, Ola, PhonePe, Meesho, Magicpin, and Shiprocket have joined ONDC. This initiative aims to break the dominance of a few players such as Amazon, Flipkart, Zomato, and Swiggy in the online retail market in India.