Revenue doubled: Lockdown fills delivery tills

Wednesday February 10, 2021

Sales doubled
Lockdown fills delivery registers

The food delivery company Delivery Hero looks at shiny shops around the world. In view of the many corona restrictions, people are ordering their meals more and more often. The Berlin Dax company is now even making money in the first regions.

The corona boom helped the Delivery Hero food delivery service achieve record sales last year. Thanks to closed restaurants, exit restrictions and the trend towards home offices around the world, revenues almost doubled to 2.8 billion euros, as the Berlin-based company announced. The number of orders increased by 96 percent to 1.3 billion.

"Looking ahead to 2021, I am confident that we will continue our success story," said company boss Niklas Östberg. The company, which has been listed in the Dax since last summer, does not want to give an outlook until the takeover of South Korean competitor Woowa has been completed – by the end of April at the latest.

Then Delivery Hero also wants to publish the exact losses for 2020. So far it is only known that the adjusted Ebitda margin including further investments was minus 20 percent. From January to June, the adjusted operating loss almost doubled despite doubling sales.

Delivery Hero is investing a lot of money in the expansion of the business – especially in the expansion of its so-called Dmarts – its own warehouses, from which the goods are delivered to customers within a very short time. At the end of December, the company, which is active in more than 40 countries, was operating 491 Dmarts.

The company is now in the black in some regions. Adjusted operating profit of 99 million euros is expected for the Middle East and North Africa, and Europe is expected to break even in operational terms by 2020. Delivery Hero sold the German business ("Lieferando") some time ago to competitor JustEatTakeaway.com, which, like the Berlin-based company, is massively promoting consolidation in the industry.

Woowa – one of Delivery Hero's largest acquisitions, is now getting more expensive, at least on paper. Due to the significantly increased share price, a write-down of up to 1.4 billion euros could be due in the context of the acquisition, Delivery Hero recently announced. The transaction is expected to close in March.