Indian Quick commerce company KiranaPro recently transitioned from using OpenAI’s API to its own ChatSutra API, developed by the Indian company TWO AI.
“No more dependencies. No more limits. Just pure Indian innovation, built to empower local commerce and showcase India to the world,” said Deepak Ravindran, founder of KiranaPro, in a post on X.
To get a better sense of what led to the shift, AIM reached out to Ravindran. “Cost is one factor. I’ve been paying a lot of money through my own credit cards for the ChatGPT servers, and that wasn’t effective for us. That was one of the primary reasons,” he explained.
OpenAI’s Realtime API, which offers low-latency, multimodal experiences like speech-to-speech, with GPT-4o, is priced at $5.00 per 1M input tokens, $2.50 for cached input tokens, and $20.00 per 1M output tokens. On the other hand, ChatSUTRA offers a free API key to get started, and the service is described as ‘free to use’ with multilingual AI capabilities.
“We were awarded one billion tokens for free by ChatSutra. We’re among the top 10 companies selected globally,” said Ravindran. He explained that those tokens give KiranaPro a runway of six months without any infrastructure cost. “It’s a big investment — more than capital,” he said, adding that TWO AI founder Pranav Mistry is officially advising the company on this journey.
Ravindran added that ChatSutra supports up to 50 languages, which is more than compared to other API providers available in the market.
KiranaPro is AI-First
Ravindran said that KiranaPro has been an AI-first company from the beginning, starting with a voice assistant. Over time, the company has expanded its use of AI beyond customer interaction to backend analytics.
It now uses predictive algorithms for demand forecasting, identifying top-selling products by region, and advising on restocking decisions.
KiranaPro also employs a dynamic pricing model that responds to customer inquiries in real time. “It’s an AI-based tool that helps you shop and navigate local commerce. Tomorrow, the assistant will actually shop for you,” he said.
Meanwhile, OpenAI and Perplexity AI recently announced new shopping features, allowing users to find, compare, and purchase products directly through the interface. When asked if he sees this as competition, Ravindran said their priority is not commerce. He added that KiranaPro is a practical, commercial, ready-to-use product for ultra-fast commerce, whereas Perplexity is essentially a search or knowledge tool.
“Our only priority is commerce. We are not building a Perplexity. We are not building a search engine. We are building a commerce engine,” he said.
KiranaPro’s competitors, like Zepto and Zomato, are also actively using AI. Zepto co-founder Kaivalya V said the company is building AI shopping assistants. Besides, the company is also developing internal tools to improve delivery speed.
On the other hand, Zomato has developed its in-house AI-native, no-code customer support platform called Nugget. It provides AI agents ranging from chatbots to co-pilots that handle complex queries, automate audits, perform image classification, and provide voice AI agents.
Zepto Killer
Ravindran sees KiranaPro as a Zepto killer and does not subscribe to the concept of dark stores. Unlike traditional quick commerce players that rely on centralised dark stores, KiranaPro’s ONDC-powered model directly connects neighbourhood kirana stores with customers.
“ONDC has 3 million kirana stores on its network, and it also has delivery partners’ APIs, so everything is plug-and-play,” said Ravindran. He shared that the company is today crossing two thousand orders per day and is the first quick commerce company in India to turn profitable.
The platform is live in multiple cities, including Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Kochi, and Thrissur, with a strong emphasis on Kerala and smaller towns.
“I consider ONDC like Linux, and KiranaPro as a distro like Red Hat,” said Ravindran, adding that the company will now sell globally. “We are launching our own network outside India, in Dubai, and it’s called Black Pearl.”
The company recently acquired Joper.app, a hyperlocal grocery delivery service, to expand its reach and strengthen its network of kirana stores. It has onboarded around 30,000 kirana stores so far and plans for rapid expansion.
Badminton star PV Sindhu recently joined the company as both investor and brand ambassador. Ravindran shared that Sindu’s team reached out them impressed by their work.
Ravindran mentioned that the company is rebranding as K.Pro, with plans to expand into categories like electronics and apparel. KiranaPro has brought on board Razia Ali as its latest investor and supporter. An entrepreneur and former executive at Dell and AMD, Razia combines deep technical know-how with global brand-building experience. “Her connections in the computer retail space can help us grow electronics sales through the platform,” said Ravindran.
The company has added Arjun Vaidya, co-founder at V3 Ventures, to its advisory board to guide growth and strategy.
Besides partnering with kirana stores, the company is also exploring collaborations with other quick commerce players like Blinkit and Flipkart. Ravindran said that if a particular product is not available on KiranaPro, the platform will redirect users to other services.
“If it’s not on KiranaPro, you can purchase it from them, and we would earn a commission on each transaction,” he explained. He added that they are working with Flipkart and other companies to get their API access.
