London-headquartered food delivery company Deliveroo has raised $575 million in a series G round of funding led by Amazon, with participation from T Rowe Price, Fidelity Management and Research Company, and Greenoaks.
This takes the company’s total funding to more than $1.5 billion since its inception in 2012. Though the company hasn’t revealed a valuation at this round, we do know it was valued at more than $2 billion at its series F round back in 2017, so the company was already comfortably into unicorn territory before this latest cash injection.
Deliveroo is a similar proposition to UberEats, insofar as it provides the transport infrastructure for restaurants of any size to offer customers delivery — it saves them from having to hire their own drivers directly. Through the mobile app, users can see what restaurants are signed up to Deliveroo in their area, place their order there and then, and see where their food is in real-time on a map. The company operates across 12 countries across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
Back in 2017, Deliveroo announced a new platform for restaurants to open delivery-only kitchens. Called Deliveroo Editions, the setup basically leverages Deliveroo’s arsenal of data to establish where customer demand for specific cuisine is, and then encourage restaurant brands to open up little kitchens near those areas. For restaurants looking to expand, Editions reduce the risk of setting up shop in expensive neighborhoods, as they only have to operate out of small huts equipped with the necessary facilities. Deliveroo then provides the infrastructure, kitchens, marketing support, software, and fleets of couriers.
The concept helps to highlight how businesses are evolving to support the transport network infrastructure enabled by the likes of Deliveroo — previously, it would have been much more difficult to operate a delivery-only kitchen, replete with lower overheads, such as this.
And this is partly what the new cash influx will be used to support — alongside growing its engineering team at its U.K. HQ.
“This new investment will help Deliveroo to grow and to offer customers even more choice, tailored to their personal tastes, offer restaurants greater opportunities to grow and expand their businesses, and to create more flexible, well-paid work for riders,” Deliveroo CEO and cofounder Will Shu.
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