The company manufactures a range of packaged foods including breakfast mixes, ready to eat meals, masalas and spices, snacks and beverages.

The company began with the establishment of the Mavalli Tiffin Room (commonly known as MTR) restaurant in Bangalore in 1924 by Yagnanarayana Maiya.

This move made it difficult for MTR to maintain high standards in its restaurant business and forced it to diversify into the instant food business by the following year, selling ready-to-eat snacks such as chutneys and rasams.

In 1984, MTR expanded out of Karnataka to the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh.

[3] In 2011, MTR launched a sub-brand called MTR SnackUp with a range of traditional South Indian snacks like Khara Boondi and Benne Murukku.