Food delivery platform to buy movie and event ticketing units

Indian food delivery platform Zomato said on Wednesday it will acquire the movie and events ticketing businesses of digital payments firm Paytm for a combined 20.48 billion rupees ($244.2 million), as the food delivery platform looks to diversify beyond food delivery.

The acquisition bolsters Zomato’s presence in India’s vast online ticketing market for movies and live events, currently dominated by Reliance-backed BookMyShow.

Paytm, which has been BookMyShow’s closest competitor since 2017, will now hand over its market share to Zomato by selling its ‘ticketnew’ platform, which sells movie tickets, as well as its ‘Insider’ platform, which handles tickets to live events.

Paytm built its movie ticketing business in-house and acquired Insider and TicketNew for 2.68 billion rupees between 2017 and 2018.

However, the company is now exiting these businesses to focus on its core payments and financial services operations, following a February order from India’s central bank to wind down its banking unit.

For Zomato, the move aligns with its efforts to expand its non-core businesses, which include restaurant table booking services and an events organizing and ticketing unit.

The two units, which accounted for 2% of Zomato’s total revenue last year, were also its fastest-growing segments.