Uber sells food delivery business in India to Zomato

Uber said on Tuesday it has sold its food delivery business, UberEats, in India to local rival Zomato as the American ride-hailing giant continues to shed lossmaking operations and become profitable by next year.

As part of the deal, Uber would own 9.99% of Zomato and its Eats users would become part of Zomato, the companies said. The deal valued UberEats’ India business between $300 million and $350 million, a person familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. TechCrunch reported last month that the two were in advanced stages of talks for a deal.

Satish Meena, an analyst at Forrester, told TechCrunch that despite the Uber deal, Zomato still lags Prosus Ventures -backed Swiggy, which services more number of orders each day.

“Our Uber Eats team in India has achieved an incredible amount over the last two years, and I couldn’t be prouder of their ingenuity and dedication,” said Dara Khosrowshahi, chief executive of Uber, in a statement. “India remains an exceptionally important market to Uber and we will continue to invest in growing our local Rides business, which is already the clear category leader. We have been very impressed by Zomato’s ability to grow rapidly in a capital-efficient manner and we wish them continued success.”

According to industry estimates, Uber is not the “clear category leader” in India. That titles belongs to Ola.

More to follow…