Image: © esthermm /Stock.adobe.com
The sale will transfer Grubhub’s $500m debt obligations to Wonder.
One of Europe’s largest food delivery companies, Just Eat Takeaway, has sold its US arm Grubhub to the New York-based Wonder Group for $650m, just four years after purchasing it for $7.3bn.
The sale had been on the cards for years for Just Eat Takeaway, which purchased Grubhub in June of 2020 when demand for contactless food deliveries was sky high due to pandemic restrictions.
Expected to conclude in the first quarter of 2025, the sale will transfer Grubhub to Wonder along with $500m in debt obligations – with Just Eat Takeaway expecting $50m in net proceeds.
The sale will increase cash generation capabilities of Just Eat Takeaway, said Jitse Groen, the company’s founder and CEO.
The Wonder Restaurant Group was founded in 2018 by entrepreneur Marc Lore. What started as a food truck delivery business has since moved to a ‘delivery-first restaurant’ concept – similar to a fast food chain.
The company has developed a new category of ‘fast-fine’ dining – a combination of the quick service associated with fast-food and ‘fine dining’ quality – allowing customers to order food from multiple restaurants from a location in one order, with restaurants making orders for delivery, pick-up or dine-in.
Earlier this year, it was announced that Wonder raised $700m in a funding round, including $100m from Lore. Lore said that the new funding will assist the business to scale from 11 locations to 35 by the end of 2024 and 90 by the end of 2025.
“Wonder’s acquisition of Grubhub continues our mission to make great food more accessible,” said Lore.
“Bringing Wonder and Grubhub together is the next step in our vision to create the super app for meal time, re-envisioning the future of food delivery.”
A year after the Grubhub purchase, Cat Rock Capital, one of Just Eat Takeaway’s largest shareholders, warned that the company was at risk of a hostile takeover and urged management to consider divesting assets or merging with a larger rival to keep the business profitable.
Just Eat Takeaway’s latest quarterly report shows that while Northern Europe, the UK and Ireland are performing well, representing a majority of the orders placed, sales in North America fell by 9pc on a year-on-year basis since last year.
Don’t miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic’s digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.
