Welcome to a new edition of ETtech Unwrapped – our weekend newsletter packed with the most important stories this week. Let’s take a look.

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Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, founders, Zepto

Zepto founders tap Edelweiss, others for Rs 1,500 crore structured debt to boost Indian ownership: Zepto founders Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra are in advanced talks with Edelweiss Alternative Asset, domestic family offices and smaller credit funds for around Rs 1,500 crore (more than $175 million) structured debt, people familiar with the matter told us.

Also Read:ETtech Explainer: Why Zepto founders are taking personal debt to boost Indian ownership

Eternal Q4 report: Net profit plummets on Blinkit losses; food delivery stays in the slow lane | Food and grocery delivery company Eternal – the parent of Zomato and Blinkit – reported a steep 78% year-on-year (YoY) fall in net profit at Rs 39 crore for the January-March quarter as losses from quick commerce continued to burden the bottomline.

Also Read: “Will grow Blinkit’s market share aggressively”: Eternal CFO Akshant Goyal

Rapido likely to run food delivery pilot in Bengaluru soon: Bike taxi platform Rapido is expected to launch a pilot programme for its food delivery service in Bengaluru in the coming weeks, said people briefed on the developments.

In fierce UPI fight, new players Flipkart-backed Super.Money, Navi, Cred start to gain ground: Newer Unified Payments Interface (UPI) apps such as Flipkart-backed Super.Money, Navi, Bhim, and Cred are increasing their share in the payment market amid a spike in UPI transactions, luring consumers with cashback offers and other incentives.

Gold loan fintechs get boost as RBI calls for digitisation: As the Reserve Bank of India strengthens its rules of governance around the gold loan sector, new-age fintech firms are sensing an opportunity either through partnerships with banks and non-banking lenders or by scaling up on their own.

Freshworks Q1 shows recovery signals, narrows loss sharply: Nasdaq-listed software-as-a-service (SaaS) company Freshworks on Tuesday reported a 19% year-on-year increase in revenue to $196.3 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2025, up from $165.1 million a year earlier.

Indian gaming companies enter big league with rising monetisation, global acquisitions: India’s gaming industry is seeing a steady rise in monetisation, especially beyond real-money gaming, as domestic firms and global investors seek to tap into the growing demand for Indian gaming intellectual property (IP) and talent, industry executives told us.

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L-R, Varun Khaitan, Raghav Chandra, Abhiraj Singh Bhal, cofounders, Urban Company

Urban Company files DRHP for Rs 1,900-crore IPO: At-home services platform Urban Company on Monday filed the draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) for a Rs 1,900-crore initial public offering (IPO).

Also Read: Urban Company founders sell Rs 780 crore worth of shares through multiple pre-IPO secondary deals

Ather Energy’s IPO sees 16% subscription on first day: Electric two-wheeler (E2W) maker Ather Energy launched its initial public offering (IPO) on April 28, with investors subscribing to 16% of the total shares available.

Also Read: Ather Energy IPO fully subscribed on Day 3 led by QIB, retail demand

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IT may add 35-45% more AI roles in FY26 as deployments rise: AI jobs are expected to expand as fast as 45% in FY26, bucking the broader circumspect trend in technology hiring, as deployment of artificial intelligence gathers further momentum across user industries, data sourced by ET from Quess IT Staffing showed.


Experts make a new case for open-source path to Indian LLMs: Foundation models funded under the IndiaAI Mission should be open sourced to help the Indian technology community to move forward at a time when there is a dearth of Indic language models available, said experts and startup executives, renewing the debate about open and closed source AI models.

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Apple App Store in India facilitated $5.3 billion in developer billings, sales in 2024: Nearly Rs 44,447 crore ($5.31 billion) went through the Apple App Store ecosystem in India in developer billings and sales in 2024, as per a study by Apple, a copy of which has been seen by ET.


Also Read: Apple exports 97.6% of iPhones to US from India amid tariffs: Report

Electronics parts PLI draws in Dixon, Tatas, Foxconn and others: Several companies including Dixon, Tata Electronics, Zetwerk and Foxconn are planning to invest through the newly launched production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for electronic components. Foxconn, through its subsidiary Yuzhan Technology, is also looking to apply under the smartphone display module category, as per people aware of the developments.