Foodpanda offers delivery service for restaurants in six cities

Food delivery start-up Foodpanda is expanding its food delivery services to restaurants across cities including Delhi, Mumbai, Gurgaon, Hyderabad, Pune and Bangalore.

Foodpanda, will now be working as third party logistics partner to its restaurant base after running the pilot phase for three months, the company said in a statement. In the last two years, the company claims it has partnered with thousands of restaurants to deliver through Foodpanda delivery services, fulfilling over 45% of the gross orders through the delivery fleet.

The product will have two offerings to partner restaurants- A fully integrated solution where in all orders would be fulfilled by the brand’s delivery riders and the other one where restaurants can take up customised service on a need to need basis.

In the initial phase of the program, the brand has on boarded more than 500 partner restaurants and the number is expected to reach around 1500 in the next three months. The restaurants would be charged on a per order basis.

Saurabh Kochhar, CEO foodpanda India said, “We have rigorously invested into the technology to make the delivery experience seamless for the users. Now with our new delivery product offering, we intend to be significant support system for our partners by easing hassle of delivery for them and extend best-in-class service levels to more customers; furthering our resolve to change the way India eats!”

Earlier, Foodpanda India's loss widened to Rs 142.6 crore in 2015-16 because of higher investments in technology, delivery and marketing. The company had registered a loss of Rs 36 crore in 2014-15.

Zomato and Swiggy have been leading the sector. Recently, it was also reported that Zomato is close to acquiring Bangalore-based last-mile delivery startup Runnr in an all-stock deal. The deal values Zomato at $800 million and pegs Runnr’s enterprise value at $40 million.

Besides, today cab aggregator Uber owned UberEats also has expanded its operation in Mumbai. It plans to launch in six cities by the end of this year. As per Industry insiders in the last three years, more than 400 restaurant delivery start-ups have come up in India.