Decoding Shorts -10
Automation is vastly changing the world surrounding us! Be it producing goods, tracking and maintaining accounts, or planning inventory. It not only helps firms to optimize the cost, drive efficiency but also to track and better plan for circumstances like Covid -19. The start-up we will be talking about today belongs to the same league called SupplyNote.
Founded by kushang kumar, an IIT Kanpur alum – the start-up helps both restaurants and suppliers to connect seamlessly on its two-way SaaS (software-as-a-service) platform allowing end-to-end digitization of the procurement process.
Problem
The fundamentals of any business lie in how it operationalizes in the backend – what we see is just the output of that. Kushang observed that the players of the F&B Industry, like Hotel chains or restaurant owners, continue to rely on pen and paper for tracking and managing their inventory. This leads to human errors, and there’s no digital track of consumption as well. Moreover, inventory procurement at a better cost is also a challenge. The Restaurant owners spend plenty of time managing processes like placing the order to suppliers and tracking food costs.
Solution
Well, Supplynote handles all of these. It automates inventory tracking, automates ordering, understands food cost in real-time, and facilitates E-commerce so that owners pay less for supplies. They promise to improve the bottom line by 70% and reduce the operations cost by 8-10%.
Scale and Scope
The size of the restaurant industry is estimated at 4.2 lakh crores, and 35% of it falls under the organized sector. Supplynote taps the same and has impacted 1200+ outlets across India. Talking about its business model – Supplynote charges an annual license fee of US$ 299 per location from the restaurant owners and charges commission on the inventory and logistics services provided by them. Besides, they also charge a margin on products sold to them through Supplynote’s E-commerce platform.
The Way Forward
Supplynote is still in its infancy, given the presence of strongly armed delivery platforms like Swiggy, Zomato, Udaan operating in a similar space. However, the start-up looks promising because of its growth trajectory. With a 70% month-on-month growth for 2020-21, Supplynote has been working feverishly to automate how food and beverage establishments run their operations. In the next few years, the business expects to grow by a significant margin, with the aim of attaining a $100 million transaction volume run rate.
Is the F&B industry ripe for these changes? Well, we think Yes! What do you think? Throw in your views in the comments!
Author - Komal Kumari