Deliveroo has reported sales to almost double to £277 million.
Despite the impressive growth in sales, the privately owned company recorded an increase in losses by 43 percent following major investments.
Deliveroo invested £106 million more last year than in 2016, spending money a new head office based in London and opening Editions pop-up kitchens.
“Our growth is matched only by our ambition. We want to become the world’s definitive food company and we have invested heavily in innovation, technology, people and restaurants. We are changing the way people eat and helping restaurants to expand to new areas and in new ways,” said the group’s co-founder and chief executive, Will Shu.
The group works with 50,000 restaurants and employs the same number of riders.
Fiona Cincotta, a senior market analyst at Cityindex said: “Deliveroo has no plans of slowing down and says that it will continue investing in further expansion.”
“And this is where the balancing act comes in. While new regions like Taiwan are likely to become a very interesting and fast-growing area for the company it is questionable as to at which point the company’s bottom line will turn black – at the current pace unlikely before the planned IPO.”
“Looking at its competitors it is clear that the expansive growth in the food delivery business can be sustained only for a relatively small number of years.”
“Shares in London-listed Just Eat which listed in 2014 rose rapidly until 2018 but are now trading at roughly the same level as they did at the beginning of the year.”
“German-listed Delivery Hero also recently warned it does not expect to break even this year or in 2019 after investments of €80 million (£71 million),” she added.
