After piloting its restaurant delivery app in Toronto and Los Angeles, the service launched in three new US cities on the 15th of March 2016 with plans to expand to more cities around the world. Uber’s move comes at a time when venture capital investors are starting to shy away from the delivery sector, which saw a surge in funding in 2014 and 2015 before cooling down in recent months, ft.com reports.
Many smaller venture capital-backed, on-demand companies have been struggling to stay afloat in the highly competitive environment, especially as Uber and Amazon have expanded their investments in food delivery services.
Uber’s founder Travis Kalanick has spoken about his vision to create a logistics network that is “as reliable as running water, everywhere for everyone”. Uber generates the vast majority of its revenue from transporting people and it also offers package delivery in some cities.
Uber previously had an “instant delivery” service within its transportation app that could deliver pre-made food items such as sandwiches during lunch hours. However its new restaurant service will operate through a standalone app and will deliver food all day from restaurants; both the restaurants and the customers will pay delivery fees.
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