What's In A Name In The Startup Game?: When Swiggy & Zomato Identify As Something Else

So, in February 2025, FoodTech goliath Zomato announced that it was changing its name. To what, you might ask? If you had to think of some of the names that might remind you about food... would "Eternal" come to the forefront of your mind? Isn't that the name of one of those pandemic-era Marvel movies or something? Because Eternal is the new name for Zomato.?

However, you won't be ordering food from Eternal. The app name stays the same, so you're still ordering from an app called Zomato. But, the stock ticker for the company would change, with Eternal comprising 4 businesses for now: Zomato the food delivery app, Blinkit, District and Hyperpure. Tall order, but Eternal - formerly known as Zomato - may be able to deliver. People seem to be having to readjust a bit more with the names they're most familiar with in the 2020s. Twitter is no longer Twitter, it's X. Facebook is no longer Facebook, it's Meta; though, the social network is still Facebook. So, the startup and business enthusiasts may soon get acclimated to calling it Eternal.

But, why the name change??

It's said that when Zomato - this might be deadnaming the company - acquired Blinkit, the team started using the name "Eternal" internally to distinguish between the company and the food delivery app.?

Interestingly, in February 2024, before it had its IPO, Eternal's rival Swiggy did the opposite. The company was previously operating under the name "Bundl Technologies" and passed a special resolution to rename itself "Swiggy Pvt Ltd". Bundl might be an interesting name to make people think of a superapp: you're bundling services and you're using technology. But, maybe, the team must have seen how a name, like Swiggy, which sounds, also, a bit cute, resonated with customers, restaurant partners, delivery personnel and other stakeholders.?

Seems like the intent was to establish somewhat of a stronger market recall, make investor relations a bit more simplified and reinforce some good ol' brand equity. While Eternal wanted to distinguish between the overall company and the app, Swiggy may have wanted to become a bit more synonymous, especially when its IPO was coming up. "Wait, what's Bundl Technologies? I'd rather go for the Swiggy IPO! I'm still trying to figure out Obama's last name." Brand confusion would have been eliminated this way. When the Swiggy IPO happened, maybe, there was a clear and unified brand identity. The institutional and retail investors may have beamed a bit more widely putting their money that directly relates to a brand they may have used, known and trusted all these years.

While Swiggy started with the food delivery route, it's touched upon grocery, quick commerce, transport, dining and more.?To get there, Swiggy acquired?Dineout?from Times Internet and awarded the company its prefix. Some of its other acquisitions, like Scootsy and Supr Daily, seemed to have helped build out its Swiggy Food, Swiggy Genie and Swiggy Instamart division.?And the Swiggy name becomes a prefix: Swiggy Genie, Swiggy Dineout, Swiggy Instamart, Swiggy Minis and more.?Though, Swiggy does have something without its name called "Lynks Logistics", which it had acquired.

With all the name changes, could a company, like Swiggy, be, kind of, going the Reliance Jio route? Even though Jio is much younger than Reliance and is less than 10 years old, it's already built somewhat of an empire under the Reliance name. Go through Jio's Wikipedia page - remember that name until Elon makes a sneaky change to the appellation when he buys it - and you'll see all the companies under Jio that have its prefix. Even the offline?place in Mumbai is called Jio World Drive. Some of these were acquisitions, too. For instance, Reliance acquired a majority stake in Saavn years ago and now, it's called JioSaavn.?

To paraphrase some corporate lingo, Jio may be looking to create some cross-platform synergy, brand consistency and ecosystem integration. So, it's unifying all its businesses under the Jio umbrella to build an empire that's across sectors and digital-first. With Swiggy and Jio, there's a central brand identity. Maybe, if someone has JioFiber, they may be more likely to use JioCinema and JioMart. That might be a smart marketing move, for sure.

So, while Jio may be operating in multiple distinct spaces, Swiggy may be going more in similar arenas, like food delivery, groceries and logistics. And Swiggy hasn't acquired as many brands, rather they may have opted to go the build-in-house route. Maybe, Swiggy won't get to Jio's scale. For now, Swiggy's seen as food-first, while Jio might have more of a tech-first perception. But, down the line, who knows?

What is your next favourite superapp going to look like?