Aadit Palicha states that the rival CFO has been giving out false numbers/Excel sheets on Zepto through sources known to journalists and calling its investors to make wild allegations
Aadit Palicha, Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of quick commerce platform Zepto, has alleged that the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of a rival company is attempting to orchestrate a smear campaign against Zepto by spreading false information and fabricated financial data.
Taking to LinkedIn, the Founder wrote, “Over the past few days, the CFO of one of our competitors has been trying to build a smear campaign against Zepto. This includes calling our investors to make wild allegations about us with no empirical evidence, giving out false numbers/Excel sheets on Zepto through sources known to journalists, and paying bots on social media to spread a negative narrative.”
Highlighting that its competitors are getting nervous regarding the improvement in Zepto’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), Palicha added that the company’s EBITDA has improved by 20 absolute percentage points (2,000 basis points) from January 2025 to May 2025, and is approaching single-digit territory.
“Our cash burn is down approximately 65 per cent over that same period,” he added. Palicha mentioned that the company has grown from approximately Rs 750 crore of gross order value (GOV) per month in May 2024 to Rs 2,400 crore of GOV per month in May 2025. The company’s definition of GOV includes fruits and vegetables at the selling price and includes advertisement revenue.
Palicha noted that at the same time, even as Zepto’s EBITDA improved sharply from January 2025 to May 2025, it has still grown roughly 20 per cent in GOV in that period. That represents an average of four to five per cent month-on-month growth.
“We expect to have the vast majority of our dark stores fully EBITDA positive (including backend supply chain costs, customer support, last mile and all fixed/variable dark store costs) by next quarter. We also expect our overall company EBITDA and operating cash flow to be within a few hundred basis points of breakeven in this same period,” he wrote.
Zepto CEO confirmed that the company is not planning a large-scale rationalisation of stores. On the contrary, it is ramping up store launches. He stated that as of the beginning of this quarter, the company has approximately Rs 7,445 crore of net cash in the bank (fully reconciled to bank statements). With its current cash burn trajectory, it has many years of runway, he mentioned.
