Restaurant chain Dindigul Thalappakatti is now valued at Rs 860 crore after it raised an undisclosed amount in a fresh round of funding, it said. The brand is owned by private equity firm CX Partners. Investors in the casual dining restaurant chain include Tree Line Investment Management, other private and public individual investors as well as the family office of the Havells Group.
Prior to this, the brand had raised funding in 2019 when CX partners had picked up a majority stake for Rs 235 crore, and at the time, it was valued at Rs 450 crore. With this round of funding, Dindigul Thalapakatti said it is looking at fast-tracking its growth plan and will be focussing on the southern states — Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana and Tamil Nadu — as well as in Sri Lanka. The chain said that in the next year, it is looking to set up 25-30 more restaurants as well as cloud kitchens. As things currently stand, the chain has 87 restaurants and cloud kitchens across its locations. Seventy-nine of these outlets in India are in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Pondicherry. The others are in locations such as UAE, Singapore, Malaysia and Sri Lanka.
The pandemic impacted the restaurant industry severely, and Dindigul Thalappaktti said that despite that, it was able to achieve 100% EBITDA recovery and was profitable during FY 2020-21.
The company’s CEO Ashutosh Bihani said, “Dindigul Thalappakatti has always commanded strong loyalty across south India and more recently in select international markets. We plan to retain our leadership in the fragmented and commoditised Biryani Market through faster yet best in class profitable growth.”
Zaheer Sitabkhan, Founder of Tree Line Investment Management, said, “DT has identified meals people love and at a price point offering fantastic value. We are impressed with what management at DT have achieved to prepare the business to grow and scale across the South and are excited to be part of their journey.”