UberEats revenue grows, outruns Uber ride-hailing business in cities

UberEats, Uber's food delivery business which is live in 30 countries, is fastly growing and earning higher revenues than its ride-hailing business in many cities.

The foodtech platform has become bigger than its ride-hailing platform in cities like Milan, Madrid and Grenoble. It now has higher revenues than Uber's Rides business in European cities, where the business has doubled in size since launch, said Toussaint Wattinne, a general manager for UberEats in London.

"When we attribute our growth and try to improve our service, the first thing that plays a bigger role is the restaurant selection we are able to provide," Wattinne said to Business Insider. It has partnered with 8,000 restaurants now in the UK. It claims to have the fastest delivery team in place.

The UK is one of the largest geographical markets in the world for UberEats, Wattinne said, adding that the service is now live in 40 cities across the nation.

UberEats started in 2014, is on track to do $3 billion in sales by the end of this year. UberEats reportedly had a turnover of $700 million (£527 million) to $870 million (£656 million) for the second quarter of this year, while Uber's total gross bookings during the period were $8.7 billion (£6.6 billion).

Uber ride-hailing business and UberEats in India

The ride-hailing company launched UberEats earlier this year in India. It is currently available in six Indian cities.

According to Uber trend report, the most ordered dishes in India on UberEats were samosa chole, Aloo Tikki Burger and Chicken Biryani.

While Indian cuisine continued to top the list of most-ordered cuisines by Indians, it was closely followed by Middle Eastern and American. UberEats competitors include Zomato, FoodPanda and Swiggy in the food delivery space in the Indian market.

Uber is eyeing a $15-20 billion market in the food delivery market, for which the demand is still unmet in the country. To expand its business, Uber has also hired former Oyo Rooms executive Vartika Bansal to help expand the food delivery business.

Whereas in ride-hailing business, which was launched four years ago, Uber completed five billion trips globally in may this year.

India has emerged as the second largest contributor after the US for the company. Besides, Bengaluru and Hyderabad have witnessed the highest number of uberPOOL (pooled) trips taken by riders in 2017, followed by Kolkata and Delhi, according to the company.

At present, Uber operates in 29 Indian cities and has 2.85 lakh active driver partners on its platform. It sees about 8 million monthly active riders. In the ride-hailing segment, it competes with Ola, which has presence in more than 100 cities in India.

Recently, Ola has re-entered food delivery space with the acquisition of Foodpanda India from the parent firm Berlin-based food delivery marketplace Delivery Hero Group.