Walmart-owned Flipkart plans to enter India’s ticketing market and pilot food delivery as early as May, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters, as the company builds out verticals ahead of a planned initial public offering (IPO).

What’s happening: Flipkart plans to sell movie and concert tickets, pitting it against BookMyShow and Zomato’s District platform. The company also plans a food delivery pilot around the same time, though sources said timelines could shift. Flipkart has not yet clarified whether ticketing and food delivery will sit inside the existing app or launch as separate products.

The IPO logic: The expansion directly ties to Flipkart’s public listing preparations:

• The company completed its corporate relocation from Singapore to India in March 2026, with Flipkart Internet Private Limited now the holding entity, after the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) approved the move in December 2025.
• The company has entered early talks with investment banks including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, and Kotak Mahindra Capital for a listing targeting for late 2026 or early 2027.
• Flipkart seeks a $2–2.5 billion pre-IPO fundraise.
• According to a Business Standard report, Flipkart targets an IPO valuation of $60–70 billion, against an internal valuation of $37 billion when Google made a $350 million investment in 2024.

Ticketing and food delivery drive daily app engagement, a metric that matters significantly when pitching to public market investors.

Why ticketing: India’s live events market has surged over the past year, driven by large-scale concerts, international tours, and cricket. BookMyShow, whose largest shareholder Reliance’s Network18 holds an approximately 37% stake as of January 2024, commands around 75–78% of online movie tickets and about 55% of live events.

The company also entered discussions with Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) at a reported valuation of around $900 million in January 2024. Zomato built District, its ticketing app, after it acquired Paytm Insider for Rs 2,048 crore in August 2024, making District the second-largest ticketing platform in the country behind BookMyShow.

Why food delivery is harder: India’s food delivery market runs as a Zomato-Swiggy duopoly, with Zomato commanding approximately 58% share and Swiggy 42%. This dominance has been built on years of investor-funded discounting that squeezed out nearly every serious challenger, including Foodpanda, Uber Eats, Amazon Food, and TinyOwl. Even the incumbents have not cracked profitability.

Regulatory baggage: Flipkart already faces significant regulatory heat as it expands:

• The Competition Commission of India (CCI) found in September 2024 that Flipkart and Amazon engaged in anti-competitive practices, including preferential treatment of select sellers and prioritising certain product listings.
• The National Consumer Helpline (NCH) logged 1,60,857 complaints against Flipkart in FY24, making it the most complained-about e-commerce platform for the fourth consecutive year.
• The Enforcement Directorate (ED) probed Flipkart’s fashion arm Myntra for alleged Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) violations worth Rs 1,654 crore.

The broader push: Ticketing and food delivery form part of a wider pre-IPO diversification:

• Flipkart Minutes, its quick commerce arm, targets over 1,500 dark stores by end of 2026, nearly double its current count of 750–850.
• India’s e-commerce market is on track to grow 12.4% in 2026.
• Discretionary spending, money consumers spend on non-essential goods like entertainment, fashion, and dining out, is expected to exceed 43% of household expenses by 2030, up from about 36% today, according to a Franklin Templeton report.

MediaNama has reached out to Flipkart with the following questions and will update the story if a response is received:

1. Can you confirm plans to launch a ticketing platform and pilot food delivery in May 2026? Have these timelines changed?
2. Which markets will the food delivery pilot launch in, and will it operate as a standalone service or within the existing Flipkart app?
3. Will ticketing be integrated into the Flipkart app or launched as a separate product?
4. How does Flipkart plan to differentiate its ticketing offering from BookMyShow and Zomato’s District?
5. Is the expansion into ticketing and food delivery connected to Flipkart’s IPO preparations and valuation strategy?
6. What is Flipkart’s logistics model for food delivery, and will it use existing Ekart infrastructure?

Also read:

• Flipkart shifts holding company to India ahead of planned IPO
• Flipkart gets NCLT nod to shift base to India before IPO
• CCI finds Amazon, Flipkart guilty of anti-competitive conduct
• Zomato acquires Paytm Insider: What it means for the online events business