Tata 1mg will be profitable in a few quarters, says founder Prashant Tandon

Tata Digital-owned e-pharmacy platform 1mg is a few quarters away from overall profitability, the company’s founder Prashant Tandon said on Friday.

“A bunch of our businesses are profitable in terms of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) and a bunch of them will be Ebitda profitable,” said Tandon at the ET Soonicorns Summit in New Delhi.

The company reported a 160% jump in operating revenue to Rs 1,627 crore for the fiscal year ended 2023. However, its net loss more than doubled from the previous year to Rs 1,254.9 crore, according to its recent regulatory filings for the financial year under review.

“We have strengthened our market share materially,” said Tandon while emphasising on the growth in the current financial year.

His comments come at a time when Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran has mandated internally that ecommerce businesses such as 1mg and e-grocer BigBasket should focus on profitability, ET had reported on September 18. BigBasket and 1mg are two of the biggest e-commerce assets for the salt-to-software conglomerate.

In June 2021, Tata Digital had acquired a majority stake in 1mg at a valuation of around $450 million. The Gurugram-based company entered the unicorn club after raising around $40 million in an internal funding round led by Tata Digital in September last year.