Delivery Hero can almost double its sales

The DAX-listed group now has sales of almost three billion euros, but continues to make losses.

Delivery Hero increased its revenue by 95 percent last year and now stands at 2.8 billion euros. Orders also apparently doubled, with customers ordering a total of 1.3 billion from the food delivery company in 2020. "We had a strong fourth quarter in a year that was exceptional in many ways," group CEO Niklas Östberg said in a company statement. The pandemic in particular was helpful for Delivery Hero. With restaurants closed, more people are ordering over the Internet.

The company plans to publish the final figures for the fiscal year only in April. Then it will also be known whether Delivery Hero will nevertheless continue to post high losses. The preliminary EBITDA margin (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) is minus 16 percent. According to Delivery Hero, the reason for the red figures is the high investments of the Berlin-based company. Earlier this year, it was announced that Delivery Hero plans to acquire its South Korean competitor Woowa. This acquisition alone is said to have cost 3.6 billion euros.

Delivery Hero was founded in Berlin in 2011 and now employs about 25,000 people, including 1,300 in the German capital. The food delivery company operates in more than 40 countries, mostly in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. Delivery Hero sold its German business to a Dutch competitor back in 2018. Delivery Hero has been listed on Germany's DAX benchmark index since August last year.