DealGuru’s response to foodpanda: a newly rebranded Food Runner

Rebate Networks-backed DealGuru spins out Asian food delivery business.

Shortly after it announced its new e-commerce line back in April, Rebate Networks-backed DealGuru spins out its new Asian food delivery business. The new food delivery subsidiary will be called “Food Runner”. According to the press release, Food Runner, will operate the Room Service Deliveries brand, which has more than 50,000 registered users and delivers several million dollars’ worth of restaurant food annually.

You might remember, back in October 2012, DealGuru acquired and absorbed Asian Room Service, the parent company of Room Service Deliveries under its umbrella of businesses. It seems like in less than a year, DealGuru decided to spin off Food Runner as a separate stand alone entity.

Lance Frey, CEO of Food Runner, who was also CFO at DealGuru, explained the rationale for the stand alone. “The business has been growing strongly. We felt it had reached a point where it made sense to operate with the greater flexibility and focus that a separate business provides. While we will continue to improve our position in Singapore and Malaysia, the next big opportunity is expansion into other Southeast Asian markets, adding millions of consumers to our reach.”

Earlier in May, Rocket Internet-backed foodpanda just confirmed that they are merging with Singapore-dine to increase its delivery services in the city-state. While the merger claims to provide its customers food delivery services from more than 200 restaurants island wide, as of the time of writing, according to its website, it only offers delivery services from 101 restaurants.

Read also: foodpanda confirms merger with Singapore-Dine

Room Delivery Services, on the other hand, did not reveal the number of restaurants which will be offering deliveries under their service. A quick check on their website showed that they are currently listing 70 restaurants, though we expect that to increase soon with the launch of its newly rebranded Food Runner.

The food delivery space is definitely heating up in Singapore. With smaller players joining up to become different main players, will we see more mergers soon? Another group of food delivery network seems to be made up of Gourmet To Go, which has partnered with Thai To Go (Thai food delivery) and George Delivery (authentic Penang food). Traditional outlets or fast food chains usually have their own in-house delivery fleet, and it will be equally as interesting to see if any of them choose to list their delivery services on platforms or aggregators such as foodpanda or Food Runner.

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