Deliveroo has secured £286m ($385m) of new investment to fund the expansion of its London-based restaurant meals delivery business, giving it a valuation of over £1.48bn ($2bn), according to the company.
The new funds will be used by Deliveroo to expand of its Editions (formerly named RooBox) programme, which sees it open delivery-only kitchens to enable partner restaurants to expand without any of the traditional upfront costs, whilst increasing food selection for customers and optimising delivery times.
The company also plans to continue to grow its technology team who, amongst other things, work on Deliveroo’s “real-time logistics algorithm and artificial intelligence systems” to help improve the speed and number of deliveries that can be made in order to increase what are otherwise very thin margins for on-demand food delivery. Another aspect to its data science is working out where it should launch the next Editions kitchens and what type of food is in demand locally.
Lastly, Deliveroo says it wants to rapidly expand into new towns, cities and countries. It said, 'This will allow more people to order great food quickly to their door from their favourite local restaurants'.
Will Shu, founder and CEO of Deliveroo, stated, “I remember how excited I was carrying out our first delivery. I hoped that people would love being able to order great food from their favourite local restaurants straight to their front door.
'I am proud that just four years on, millions of people use Deliveroo in over 150 cities around the world. This is all thanks to the hard work of our riders, the great restaurants that we work with and our brilliant customers.
'So I am extremely pleased that our new investors share this vision and have decided to make such a significant investment in our future.'
Shue concluded, 'With this funding we will invest further in our delivery-only kitchens Editions, in developing our technology and in taking Deliveroo to more towns and cities. This investment will take us to the next level and allow our riders to deliver ever more great food directly to people’s doors.'
