Ola Wants to Grow its Food and Beverage Division on ONDC
The popular ride-hailing service Ola plans to soon extend its food and beverage (F&B) vertical throughout India via the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC). Ola is one of the top two platforms on ONDC that creates significant demand in the F&B market, according to Thampy Koshy, managing director and chief executive officer of the organisation, who was speaking at the launch of the ONDC white paper, "Driving Digital Inclusion: Open Networks and Zero-Commission Mobility Apps." Ola has notified ONDC that they will shortly expand its F&B business throughout India. Additionally, it just began providing groceries and plans to add other divisions shortly, Koshy stated. It is important to remember that Ola only provides F&B services in a few cities at this time through ONDC.
Offering Last-Mile Logistics Services
Ola provides last-mile logistics services for every category, including grocery shopping, food delivery, and pharmaceuticals through ONDC, in addition to food delivery. This occurs as Uber and Rapido, Ola's fiercest competitors, have also jumped on the ONDC bandwagon to increase the range of services they offer. Uber signed a deal with the Chennai Metro Rail (CMRL) earlier this year to broaden its mobility capabilities, while Rapido sells tickets for the service directly through the ONDC platform. Namma Yatri, a union-backed ride-hailing business, also joined forces with ONDC a few months ago to launch its taxi and car rental services.
ONDC’s Performance
According to the recently released ONDC report, since December of last year, the volume of transactions on ONDC has increased by about three times. By December 2025, it is anticipated that the number of transactions would have increased by 7-8X. It is important to note that in October, ONDC saw 14 million transactions. The mobility segment accounted for over 5.5 million of these transactions, while the non-mobility categories accounted for 8.4 million. As this number has increased, ONDC has also been modifying its commission structure. It reduced the incentive for network participants earlier this month from INR 60 lakh for the October holiday season to INR 40 lakh for December.
Open Network Models will Reap Benefits
The Government of India launched ONDC with the goal of decentralising e-commerce by giving local vendors and small enterprises an equal opportunity to compete with larger platforms. The drawbacks of the present ride-hailing systems, including low driver pay and poor customer service, are examined in a recently released white paper.
According to the findings, India's economy might benefit from an annual contribution of INR 51,000 crore to INR 67,000 crore if open network models are used in the country's mobility sector. A 30% increase in driver wages is also possible, which may enhance their annual income by INR 1.36 lakh.
From orders over INR 250, ONDC will start charging a transaction fee of INR 1.50 from January 1, 2025. This fee, intended to guarantee the platform's financial stability, will be borne by sellers, including logistics companies, lenders, and insurers.
Nitin Konde
