zepto: Quick-commerce firm Zepto elevates Nikhil Mittal to chief technology officer

Mittal joined Zepto as its first employee more than two years ago, and has been associated with the company since then. His elevation comes after the Mumbai-based startup recently raised $31.25 million in a fresh funding round from existing investors such as Goodwater Capital and Nexus Venture Partners.

With this promotion, Mittal will head Zepto’s engineering team of over 200 engineers and also be responsible for scaling it by hiring new employees.

Founded in 2021 by two Stanford dropouts, Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, the company became India’s first unicorn startup in 2023 with a valuation of $1.4 billion.

“Nikhil himself from scratch helped to build our engineering team and got the first infrastructure built out. The first version of the (Zepto) app was built out by Nikhil along with Kaivalya. Since then, he has scaled himself and now is in a position where he can manage a team of 200 people,” Palicha, CEO of Zepto, told ET.

This comes three months after Zepto elevated its senior vice president of product, Ankit Agarwal, to the role of chief product officer.

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Zepto also witnessed a series of top-level exits last year, including chief marketing officer Amritansu Nanda who departed after a two-year tenure, engineering head Yash Dayal and chief financial officer Jitendra Nagpal.“We want to consolidate everything under Kaivalya, so that it will be much more seamless between engineering, product, analytics, data science and now we have got strong leaders in all functions,” Palicha said.

Mittal, Agarwal, and the analytics and data science team will be reporting directly to Vohra.

Zepto has around 1,300 employees and is planning to launch more stores in top metro cities like Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi NCR and Kolkata. The company is looking to achieve profitability in 2024, Palicha said.

Swiggy’s Instamart, BigBasket’s BB Now, Zomato’s Blinkit and Reliance Retail-backed Dunzo are Zepto’s main competitors in the quick commerce space.

Mittal joined Zepto as its first employee more than two years ago, and has been associated with the company since then. His elevation comes after the Mumbai-based startup recently raised $31.25 million in a fresh funding round from existing investors such as Goodwater Capital and Nexus Venture Partners.

With this promotion, Mittal will head Zepto’s engineering team of over 200 engineers and also be responsible for scaling it by hiring new employees.

Founded in 2021 by two Stanford dropouts, Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, the company became India’s first unicorn startup in 2023 with a valuation of $1.4 billion.

“Nikhil himself from scratch helped to build our engineering team and got the first infrastructure built out. The first version of the (Zepto) app was built out by Nikhil along with Kaivalya. Since then, he has scaled himself and now is in a position where he can manage a team of 200 people,” Palicha, CEO of Zepto, told ET.

This comes three months after Zepto elevated its senior vice president of product, Ankit Agarwal, to the role of chief product officer.

Discover the stories of your interest

Zepto also witnessed a series of top-level exits last year, including chief marketing officer Amritansu Nanda who departed after a two-year tenure, engineering head Yash Dayal and chief financial officer Jitendra Nagpal.“We want to consolidate everything under Kaivalya, so that it will be much more seamless between engineering, product, analytics, data science and now we have got strong leaders in all functions,” Palicha said.

Mittal, Agarwal, and the analytics and data science team will be reporting directly to Vohra.

Zepto has around 1,300 employees and is planning to launch more stores in top metro cities like Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi NCR and Kolkata. The company is looking to achieve profitability in 2024, Palicha said.

Swiggy’s Instamart, BigBasket’s BB Now, Zomato’s Blinkit and Reliance Retail-backed Dunzo are Zepto’s main competitors in the quick commerce space.