Deliveroo's co-founder and CEO, William Shu (Photo via Deliveroo)
It's not that common for European tech startups to raise the kind of eye-popping numbers that so-called unicorns are getting in Silicon Valley funding rounds, but one food-delivery startup in London may be on course to buck the trend. Deliveroo has just raised $100 million in a Series D investment round, a remarkable third round of funding within one year.
Yuri Milner’s DST Global, best known for being an early backer of Facebook, Alibaba and Xiaomi, las led the investment along with Greenoaks Capital, Accel, Hummingbird Ventures and Index Ventures. The company, which offers an on-demand delivery service for restaurants who typically don’t do takeaways, said it is also expanding into five new cities: Dubai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Melbourne and Sydney.
Deliveroo had already raised $25 million in January and another $70 million in July to put towards its international expansion plans. The company’s latest funding round values it at $600 million, according to the FT, and to date it has raised $200 million, making it one of the best funded startups in Europe.
Deliveroo was founded just two years ago by William Shu, a former investment banker, and software developer Greg Orlowski, and relies on a logistics platform to connect delivery drivers with chain restaurants like Gaucho, Soho House Group and Wagamama.
The company claims its drivers take an average of 32 minutes to make deliveries to homes and offices, and each delivery charges a fixed, £2.50 fee while restaurants also pay a commission to Deliveroo.
“It’s been phenomenal to see the business quickly expand from London to European capitals and some of the most exciting cities in Asia Pacific and the Middle East,” said Shu.
“Will and the Deliveroo team are dedicated to providing a great food delivery experience for their customers, restaurant partners and drivers," DST's Milner said in an official statement. "We hope this new round will support their continued growth.”
