Bengaluru/New Delhi: Eternal Ltd kicked off the second half of the fiscal year riding on the strength of its quick commerce arm Blinkit, which posted its highest growth in 10 quarters even as losses stayed flat.
The Gurugram-based food delivery and quick commerce company reported revenue of ₹13,590 crore for the July–September quarter, 2.72 times higher than a year earlier. The number beat analyst expectations — a Bloomberg poll had pegged Eternal’s revenue at ₹8,852 crore. The company’s net profit fell 63% year-on-year to ₹65 crore, as higher delivery, marketing and fulfilment costs, along with expenses from store expansion and inventory purchases, weighed on its bottom line.
Eternal earns its revenue from four key businesses — Blinkit, food delivery, Hyperpure, and District. Quick commerce continued to dominate the company’s earnings, contributing ₹9,891 crore, or nearly three-fourths of total revenue. The food delivery business brought in ₹2,485 crore, while Hyperpure, its B2B supplies vertical for restaurants, generated ₹1,023 crore. The remaining ₹189 crore came from District, Eternal’s “going-out” platform that brings together dining, events, movies, and now retail stores under one app.
Blinkit drives decade-high growth
Blinkit’s total value of orders, known as net order value (NOV), jumped 137% compared with the same quarter last year and 27% over the previous quarter — its strongest growth in ten quarters. Its adjusted Ebitda — earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, a measure of the company’s operating profit — improved slightly to -1.3% of total orders from -1.8% in the first quarter of FY26, while total losses stayed around ₹128 crore.
“The pace of margin improvement was slower than what we had anticipated at the beginning of the quarter, and that is because of additional investments in market share growth,” said Deepinder Goyal, founder and CEO of Eternal, in the company’s September quarter letter to shareholders.
Blinkit’s margin expansion slowed during the quarter compared to the previous one, hurt by higher marketing spends, which were nearly four times more than a year ago, as the company sought to acquire new customers and expand its network. The company added 272 new stores, taking the total to 1,816, and aims to reach 3,000 by March 2027.
“There are new consumers out there in the market, and if we are able to onboard them at a reasonable marketing cost, we will continue investing as much as we can to power growth,” said Albinder Dhindsa, founder and CEO of Blinkit, while interacting with analysts in a post-earnings call.
“As long as we see a healthy customer acquisition cost (CAC) and a healthy lifetime value (LTV), we won’t shy away from spending more on marketing because we are acquiring a good-quality customer base,” added Akshant Goyal, CFO of Eternal.
Eternal expects full transition of Blinkit to an inventory-led model, which currently covers 80% of its order value and aims to reach 90% by the next quarter. “Our transition to an inventory-led model is almost complete, and we expect this shift to result in a margin expansion of about one percentage point over the next few quarters,” Goyal said.
In an inventory-led model, the company stocks products in its own warehouses rather than relying solely on third-party sellers to deliver items. This allows Blinkit to fulfil orders faster and manage costs better, which can improve profit margins over time.
Meanwhile, the company said recent GST rate cuts reduced the average tax rate on Blinkit’s basket by about 3 percentage points, which is expected to drive stronger demand from October-December onwards. “This has had a slight negative impact on the growth of the business as we have passed on this tax burden to customers,” CFO Goyal said. Around 25% of orders that are not free are impacted by the 18% GST on delivery charges for food delivery, Mint had reported earlier.
He said that net working capital rose to ₹2,000 crore due to the inventory shift but remains within manageable levels. “That’s not really a milestone we’re chasing right now,” he said on Blinkit’s break-even timeline. “Parts of the business are already profitable; the reported margin is a weighted average of mature and expansion markets.”
“We expect growth to remain above 100% for at least the next couple of years,” Dhindsa said, noting that around three-fourths of new store additions continue to come from top-tier cities.
Food delivery shows slow recovery
The food delivery business showed early signs of recovery after five quarters of slowing growth. Net order value rose 14% year-on-year in the September quarter, while profitability improved to a record high of 5.3% of NOV, up from 5% in the previous quarter.
“On the growth front, Eternal delivered a clear win — Blinkit’s NOV surged ~137% YoY with solid sequential momentum, and food delivery growth held up in the teens. That’s a beat on top line,” said Sandeep Abhange, research analyst, consumer and midcaps at LKP Securities.
“On margins, it’s mixed: the food business hit a record ~5.3% adjusted EBITDA margin, which is a pleasant surprise. But the quick commerce vertical’s margin recovery, while improved, was slower than many expected — and consolidated EBITDA margins remain under pressure,” Abhange said. “So the real test ahead is sustained margin acceleration, not just growth.”
In the company’s shareholder letter, Deepinder Goyal said food delivery growth aligned with company expectations, noting that year-over-year NOV growth turned positive after several quarters of decline.
“Having said that, the recovery in growth has been slower than expected, and we only expect a slow uptick in growth rate in the near term. While we continue to work on inputs to the business (making restaurant food more accessible and affordable for customers), we are also constantly fighting multiple headwinds, including soft discretionary consumption in general in India, the impact of quick commerce growth and increasingly volatile weather (extreme heat, extended rains), which continue to weigh on near-term growth,” said CFO Akshant Goyal said in the letter.
He also said that profitability improved this quarter due to a platform fee hike, which was a reaction to a competitor’s move. Eternal also lowered its minimum order value for free delivery under the Gold program to ₹99 from ₹199 to attract more budget-conscious customers.
Other verticals and outlook
The Hyperpure business grew 42% year-on-year to ₹940 crore as restaurant supplies increased, even as total reported revenue from the vertical fell sequentially due to the wind-down of its non-restaurant business. Eternal said it expects the unit to turn profitable over the next two quarters as margins improved to -0.9% from -2.2% in the June quarter of FY26.
The company continued to invest in District, adding a new category called “Stores” alongside dining, movies, and event ticketing. “Our customer base continues to expand rapidly, giving us the confidence to keep investing in building District as the one-stop destination in India for discovering multiple going-out use cases,” Deepinder Goyal said.
Eternal’s shares closed nearly 2% lower at ₹348.40 apiece on the BSE after touching a 52-week high of ₹368.40 earlier in the day.
“After making a new high around ₹368, prices dipped sharply, breaking below the 20-day EMA,” said Rajesh Bhosale, equity, technical and derivative analyst at Angel One. “The short-term momentum may remain under pressure with profit booking likely to pull the stock towards ₹320, which could act as a buying zone. On the flip side, ₹355 would be seen as immediate resistance.”
