India's Delhivery contests metrics in rival Ecom Express' IPO filing

Indian logistics firm Delhivery has publicly contested the accuracy of the metrics presented by competitor Ecom Express in its draft initial public offering prospectus, a rare confrontation in the lead-up to the latter’s market debut. 

Delhivery, backed by SoftBank and already publicly listed, claims Ecom Express has inaccurately represented Delhivery’s business metrics when drawing comparisons in its IPO filing. 

The 442-page draft prospectus (PDF) submitted by Ecom Express last month said the startup had shipped 514.41 million packages in the fiscal year ended March 2024, while Delhivery handled 740 million during the same period. 

Delhivery alleged in a filing to the stock exchanges on Friday that this comparison was flawed, asserting that what it considers a single shipment is counted as two by its rivals, suggesting that Ecom Express’ volume figures are potentially inflated. Delhivery said that its rival counts returned orders as two shipments.

Delhivery also called out Ecom Express’ cost per shipment (CPS) calculations, citing disparities in accounting methods and alleging inflated shipment figures.

The SoftBank-backed firm also pointed out that Ecom Express’ claim that it offers its services in 27,000 zipcodes isn’t accurate, as India has fewer than 19,500 unique zip codes.

This public dispute comes less than a month after Ecom Express, which counts Warburg Pincus, Partners Group and British International Investment among its backers, filed for an IPO, aiming to raise $310 million. 

Delhivery has also questioned Ecom Express’ presentation of service EBITDA and corporate costs, citing a lack of consistent definitions for these metrics in the prospectus.

Ecom Express didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.