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Swarup Bose Built a ₹500 Crore Logistics Company Without Owning a Single Truck | Celcius Logistics
Episode 65
Tuesday, 16 December, 2025
How did Swarup Bose build a ₹500 crore cold chain logistics company without owning a single truck? In this episode, we unpack the asset-light playbook behind Celcius Logistics and the massive opportunity in India's broken cold chain industry. India wastes ₹1.3 trillion worth of perishables every year, with 23% of food rotting before it reaches consumers. Swarup Bose saw this crisis firsthand during his 20 years in cold chain manufacturing and decided to fix it. Founded during the COVID lockdown in 2020, Celcius Logistics has grown from ₹8 lakh in monthly revenue to nearly ₹500 crore annually, serving quick commerce giants like Blinkit, Zepto, and Zomato. In this candid conversation with host Akshay Datt, Swarup reveals how he raised capital from 85 individual investors with ₹1-10 lakh checks before landing a ₹250 crore Series B. He breaks down why cold chain is a "terrifying" industry where a 3-degree temperature shift can destroy an entire shipment, and how Celsius built proprietary tech to reduce wastage from 8% to just 0.4%. With IPO plans in the next three years, this is the definitive conversation on India's cold chain revolution. What You Will Learn in This Episode: 👉🏻 How Swarup Bose built Celcius into India's largest tech-enabled cold chain platform without owning trucks or warehouses 👉🏻 The economics of cold chain logistics and why it is 2.5x more expensive but 2.5x more profitable than dry logistics 👉🏻 How Celcius powers quick commerce deliveries for Blinkit, Zepto, and other 10-minute delivery platforms 👉🏻 The fundraising journey from 85 angel investors to a ₹250 crore Series B during the funding winter 👉🏻 Why 85% of India's cold chain remains unorganized and how Celcius is aggregating this fragmented market 👉🏻 Swarup's IPO roadmap and vision for Celcius in the next five years#FoodWasteIndia #AgriLogisticsIndia #StartupFundingIndia #SeriesBFunding #LogisticsTech #FounderThesis #IndianStartups #StartupIPOIndia #FarmToFork #PerishableLogistics #IndiaSupplyChain
