From Foodiebay to Zomato to Eternal: The Incredible Journey

From Foodiebay to Zomato to Eternal: The Incredible Journey of an Indian Startup

There was a time when finding a restaurant meant asking friends, checking printed menus, or visiting restaurants in person. Then a small idea began changing the way people discovered food in India.

What started with scanned restaurant menus eventually became Zomato, one of India's best-known technology brands. Today, the company has evolved further under the name Eternal, with Zomato continuing as one of its major businesses.

The journey from Foodiebay to Zomato to Eternal is a story of experimentation, adaptation, risk-taking and continuous reinvention.

The Idea Behind Foodiebay

The story began with Deepinder Goyal, who was working at Bain & Company. In 2007, he started building a simple website to make restaurant menus easier to access.

According to Goyal's own account, he and his wife and her younger sister would collect restaurant menus, scan them and put them online. The website initially received only around 25 visitors a day.

The website was first called Foodlet.in and was soon renamed Foodiebay.

At this stage, there was no grand plan to build a massive food-tech company. It was simply an attempt to solve a practical problem: helping people discover restaurant information more easily.

When Pankaj Chaddah Joined the Journey

In 2008, Deepinder Goyal's colleague at Bain & Company, Pankaj Chaddah, became interested in Foodiebay.

Goyal has recalled that Chaddah saw the website's limited traffic and offered to help. After promoting Foodiebay among their colleagues, traffic increased almost immediately.

On July 10, 2008, Goyal and Chaddah officially began building the business together—a date that Zomato has historically celebrated as its founding day.

The small website was beginning to look like a real startup.

Why Foodiebay Became Zomato

Foodiebay's ambitions soon became much larger than restaurant menus.

The company wanted to expand into more cities and countries and eventually offer recommendations, dining information and other services. But the name Foodiebay could limit how people perceived the business.

In 2010, the company changed its name to Zomato.

Goyal explained at the time that the new name was intended to be broader and less restrictive than Foodiebay. The company also wanted a name that could support expansion beyond its original restaurant-directory identity.

This was an important lesson in the company's journey:

A successful startup sometimes has to change its identity to match its future ambitions.

From Restaurant Directory to Food-Tech Platform

Zomato did not remain simply a restaurant listing website.

The company gradually added restaurant reviews, recommendations, mobile applications, online ordering, dining-related services and food delivery.

Its original focus on restaurant discovery gave it something valuable: a large audience already interested in food.

That audience became an important foundation for its next stage of growth.

By 2015, Goyal described Zomato as having evolved from a restaurant information directory into a broader food business, with online ordering becoming an important part of its expansion.

Entering the Food-Delivery Market

Food delivery became one of Zomato's biggest opportunities.

Instead of simply helping customers decide where to eat, Zomato could now help them actually order food and have it delivered.

This created a complex ecosystem involving:

Customers
Restaurants
Delivery partners
Payments
Technology
Logistics
Customer support

The company had to solve problems far beyond building a website or mobile application.

It needed technology capable of coordinating thousands of restaurants, orders and deliveries.

Competition Made the Market Tougher

Zomato's growth also brought intense competition.

Companies such as Swiggy competed aggressively for customers, restaurants and delivery partners. The food-delivery market became a race involving technology, pricing, convenience, restaurant selection and delivery speed.

For Zomato, simply acquiring users wasn't enough. It also needed to build a sustainable business.

This is one of the less glamorous realities of startup success: rapid growth creates its own set of problems.

The 2021 IPO

A major milestone arrived in 2021, when Zomato became a publicly listed company.

The IPO was significant for India's startup ecosystem because it demonstrated that a consumer internet company could move from the venture-capital stage into the public markets.

But going public also meant greater scrutiny.

Revenue, growth, profitability, business strategy and long-term sustainability became important considerations for investors.

The IPO did not mark the end of Zomato's journey. Instead, it opened the door to a much larger phase of expansion. Eternal's current website describes the 2021 IPO as an important milestone before the company expanded beyond food delivery.

The Blinkit Bet

One of the company's biggest strategic moves was its expansion into quick commerce through Blinkit.

At first, grocery and essentials delivery might seem very different from restaurant discovery.

But the underlying consumer behavior was similar: people increasingly wanted convenience, technology-enabled ordering and fast delivery.

Blinkit gave the company an opportunity to participate in a much larger everyday-consumption market.

This was another example of Zomato's willingness to move beyond its original business.

From Zomato to Eternal

The biggest transformation came when the company moved beyond the Zomato identity and adopted the name Eternal for the parent company.

In his February 2025 letter to shareholders, founder Deepinder Goyal explained that the name Eternal represented more than a corporate rebranding. He described it as a mission statement for the company's future.

The Eternal group was set to comprise four major businesses:

Zomato – food delivery and restaurant discovery
Blinkit – quick commerce
District – going-out and consumer experiences
Hyperpure – restaurant supply and sourcing

The distinction is important: Zomato remains a business and consumer brand, while Eternal is the larger corporate group.

What Makes the Zomato Story Special?

The most interesting part of this journey is how many times the company reinvented itself.

It moved through several stages:

Restaurant menus → Foodiebay → Zomato → Restaurant discovery → Food delivery → Multiple businesses → Eternal

Each stage was built on what came before it.

The company didn't abandon its existing strengths. Instead, it used its technology, customer base, restaurant relationships and understanding of consumer behavior to enter new areas.

Today, Eternal describes Zomato as a food-tech ecosystem connecting consumers, restaurants and delivery partners, while the wider group also includes Blinkit, District and Hyperpure.

Lessons Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Zomato

1. Start With a Real Problem

Foodiebay began with a simple problem: restaurant information wasn't easily accessible.

The idea didn't need to be revolutionary. It needed to be useful.

2. Your First Idea Doesn't Have to Be Your Final Idea

The company didn't remain a restaurant-directory website.

It evolved as customer expectations changed.

3. Listen to Your Users

Zomato's development was strongly influenced by what customers wanted—from restaurant information and reviews to recommendations and ordering.

4. Don't Be Afraid to Reinvent

The transition from Foodiebay to Zomato and eventually to Eternal shows that businesses sometimes need to change their identity and strategy as they grow.

5. Think Beyond the Original Market

Zomato could have remained focused only on restaurant discovery. Instead, it entered food delivery and later expanded into quick commerce and other consumer businesses.

The Journey Continues

The story of Foodiebay, Zomato and Eternal is still being written.

What began as a small website containing scanned restaurant menus has grown into a much broader technology ecosystem.

The company's official website currently describes Eternal as a group built around Zomato, Blinkit, District and Hyperpure, while Zomato continues its food-delivery and restaurant-discovery business.

The biggest lesson may be the simplest one:

You don't always need to begin with a billion-dollar idea. You need to identify a real problem, solve it well and remain willing to evolve.

Foodiebay solved a small problem.

Zomato transformed food discovery and delivery.

Eternal represents the company's attempt to build something much larger.

And that makes the journey from Foodiebay to Zomato to Eternal one of the most fascinating startup stories in India's technology ecosystem.

Sources

Eternal Official Website

Zomato

Disclaimer

This article is for informational and educational purposes only. Information is based on publicly available sources and may change over time. Digital Startup India is not affiliated with or officially associated with Eternal Ltd., Zomato, or the individuals mentioned in this article.