Zomato promotes ex-CFO Akriti Chopra as Co-Founder ahead of IPO

Zomato until now, had four co-founders - Deepinder Goyal, Gunjan Patidar, Gaurav Gupta and Mohit Gupta. Akriti Chopra, who has been at the company for a decade, is now a co-founder in the foodtech company. Ahead of the company's IPO, Deepinder Goyal announced the elevation in an internal email, reports suggest. “Tuki (Akriti), I know this doesn’t mean much to you, because you have always been a founder at Zomato. Sometimes more than me, but never less than me. Thank you. Congratulations for now officially being a founder at Zomato,” Goyal wrote in the email.

Deepinder Goyal and Gunjan Patidar were the first founders of the food-tech startup. Similar to Akriti, Gaurav Gupta and Mohit Gupta, were promoted as co-founders. In fact, this doesn't come as surprise as, in 2019, the company had launched the Founder’s Programme. According to the programme, Zomato would promote people in the company to the “founder” level.  The Gurugram-based startup has made several changes to its leadership positions in the past year. In October, it lifted Akshant Goyal as the new Chief Financial Officer. He replaced Akriti Chopra, becoming the third person to hold the CFO title.

Chopra was CFO till October. She left the position soon after the company got active with its IPO plans. “This was when the CFO role started becoming more of an external-facing role in the run-up to our IPO,” Goyal had stated while appointed Akshant. Akriti subsequently became the CPO at Zomato.

Building Zomato, states Akriti Chopra

Chopra had come from PwC to the startup in 2011 as a senior manager of finance and operations. She later became the Chief Financial Officer and Chief People Officer. Chopra, who graduated from Lady Shri Ram College, played an important role in establishing and scaling business financials for the company. She also contributed to the company’s in-house legal, governance, risk and compliance teams.

“Akriti has been here for almost a decade. She has an undying commitment to Zomato and our well-being. She has been one of the strongest pillars of support for Zomato, as we weathered multiple ups and downs through these years. Akriti has mostly been behind the scenes all these years, working hard and building an impeccable finance team,” Goyal announced in the mail.

Akriti's Linkedin bio too, from October 2020, states "Building Zomato".