Delivery Hero acquires Zomato’s food delivery business in UAE for $172 million

Another day another Delivery Hero acquisition in MENA.

As reports last month suggested, Berlin-headquartered Delivery Hero today has announced the acquisition of Indian food delivery unicorn Zomato’s food delivery business in the United Arab Emirates. The acquisition is being made through Delivery Hero’s Talabat (Talabat Middle East Internet Services Company).

The statement by the company has not revealed the financial details of the transaction but India Times has reported that Delivery Hero is paying $172 million for Zomato UAE.

Zomato that is now present in over 20 countries had expanded to UAE in 2012 – it was the country’s first international market.

Delivery Hero in the statement has said that the acquisition will add 1.2 million month orders and $2 million in monthly revenue to Delivery Hero’s MENA Business and strengthen its “leadership position” in the country. That translates into $24 million of annual revenue.

Almost half or $359 million of Delivery Hero’s revenue last year had come from MENA (including Turkey). The company had facilitated over 190 million orders in the region with a GMV of over $2.3 billion in 2018.

Delivery Hero also owns Kuwait’s Carriage and Talabat (now HQed in Dubai), Egypt’s Otlob, and Saudi’s Hunger Station. All the startups were acquired by Delivery Hero or Rocket Internet during the last few years.

Niklas Östberg, CEO of Delivery Hero, said, “Zomato has built a successful food delivery business in the UAE and India on the back of its restaurant search and discovery app and website. The acquisition will allow us to further improve our service to customers in the UAE. We are also excited to become a shareholder in Zomato’s rapid food delivery growth story in India and share our learnings.“

Delivery Hero will also participate in Zomato’s latest funding round by investing USD $50 million into Zomato’s global business, the company said in the statement.

Deepinder Goyal, CEO of Zomato, commented: “I am delighted to welcome Delivery Hero as a partner and shareholder and look forward to learning from their global experience to help us strengthen our fast-growing India food delivery business.”