Latest news with #superapp
Fast Company
5 days ago
- Business
- Fast Company
Wonder, Marc Lore's food tech startup, is planning to go public in early 2028
Billionaire entrepreneur and Wonder CEO Marc Lore has confirmed that his food and restaurant technology startup is planning for an initial public offering. And though it won't happen right away, he offered a very specific timeframe. 'We're going to IPO [and we're] kind of working backwards from March 30, 2028,' Lore said on Thursday at Fast Company 's Most Innovative Companies Summit in New York. 'Whether we hit it or not, we will see.' He added that a full board of directors is in place and that the restaurant technology startup wants to 'look and act like a public company' by the end of next year in preparation for the future offering. 'So all of 2027, we get four quarters of practice,' Lore said. 'That was really important to me to get four quarters of practice where we're giving EPS guidance, having quarterly earnings calls, doing the comp committee, treating it like a public company. So when we go public in Q1 of 2028, we've already had that muscle.' He predicted an accelerating growth rate for the business, continuing through 2028 with $5 billion in revenue, and additional 'big growth' in 2029. The 'Amazon of food' grows up Wonder, which Lore has described as a kind of 'Amazon for food and beverage,' has brick-and-mortar restaurants and a vertically integrated food delivery app. Lore is working to revolutionize the food and restaurant space, building a 'superapp for mealtime,' blending food delivery, AI-driven nutrition, and smart restaurant tech. The company most recently secured $600 million in a funding round backed by Google Ventures, for a post-funding valuation of $7 billion, according to PitchBook. Wonder ranks No. 45 on Fast Company's World's Most Innovative Companies list for 2025. The ultimate goal? To become the platform that meets all your food needs, while embracing personalized dining, driven by AI. Lore's Wonder not only owns the delivery platform but also the restaurants on its platform, with locations spanning 25 or 30 different restaurants across every cuisine type—from steakhouse to burgers and barbecue, Chinese, Italian, Mexican, Greek, Middle Eastern, and Spanish tapas. The startup has also acquired a number of food companies, including Blue Apron, Grubhub, and the media brand Tastemade. When asked by Mansueto Ventures CEO Stephanie Mehta why an an IPO the goal, Lore replied, 'I am really excited about having that public currency.' The entrepreneur has founded a number of notable companies, including which he sold to Walmart nine years ago. 'I think there's so much growth and potential in this business that we could put a lot of capital to work, even post-IPO,' Lore said. 'I'm excited to do some big acquisitions.'
Arab News
17-05-2025
- Business
- Arab News
Saudi startup Ejari plans to scale as demand grows
RIYADH: Property tech startup Ejari aims to build a full-service real estate 'super app' as it positions itself at the center of Saudi Arabia's rapidly digitizing housing market with its rent-now, pay-later model. The company, founded in 2022, is moving beyond flexible rental payments to offer furnishing, maintenance, and relocation services through integrated third-party partnerships. In an interview with Arab News, CEO Yazeed Al-Shamsi said Ejari's approach is reshaping the renter experience by offering a streamlined, digital alternative to the country's traditional leasing system, where tenants are typically required to pay six or 12 months upfront. Al-Shamsi said the platform is now preparing to widen its offering beyond residential rentals, targeting commercial and industrial leases as part of a broader plan to become a real estate super app. He told Arab News that the idea for Ejari was sparked by his personal experience as a student in the UK, where he struggled with upfront rental payments demanded by landlords. 'That was the first time I ever struggled with rent,' Al-Shamsi said. 'The solution was that an insurance company would come in and guarantee your rent.' After returning to Saudi Arabia, and facing similar rigid payment structures in the local market, he and his co-founders set out to address the challenge head-on. Ejari's core business model centers on leasing properties from landlords in bulk payments, then subleasing them to tenants through installment plans. 'We pivoted six to seven times before landing on our current model, which allows us to lease the property from the landlord with a bulk payment and then lease it back in installments to tenants with a higher price,' Al-Shamsi said. This structure, he added, creates a win-win dynamic: landlords receive their payments upfront, while tenants benefit from affordable monthly payments. The plan is to start activating different types of rent on the offices, shops, malls, as well as the industrial sector. Yazeed Al-Shamsi, Ejari CEO The platform, which currently operates in 17 cities across eight regions in Saudi Arabia, is part of a growing cohort of startups targeting financial accessibility in the real estate market. In its first year, Ejari reported generating over $30 million in service demand and has since seen that figure rise above $50 million, all with minimal marketing investment. 'This is off a very modest marketing spend of probably just over a hundred thousand dollars,' Al-Shamsi said. Despite being in operation for less than two years, Ejari is already seeing strong financial indicators. 'Our revenues are very healthy. Our loan book is very healthy. We've grown probably over 10 times between 2023 and 2024,' Al-Shamsi stated, noting further growth early in 2025. Still, he acknowledged the challenges in achieving profitability. 'We're a long way from profitability, but it is something that we've been keeping on top of mind. The current phase is growth.' Al-Shamsi emphasized Ejari's differentiated approach compared to traditional financing companies. 'Banks, financing companies — they're doing 20, 30, 40 things at one time,' he said. 'Versus us, where we're just trying to do one thing. And as soon as we perfect it, we can then start doing other things.' The vision for Ejari extends well beyond rent facilitation. The company's long-term strategy is to become a real estate super app, providing a full suite of services throughout the customer lifecycle. 'Today, we're helping the customer with payment facilitation. The customer moves into the apartment — it's an empty apartment. We help them furnish it. They live in it. A light bulb goes off — we help them fix it. Tomorrow they want to move — we offer a button they hit, then a team comes and helps them move,' Al-Shamsi explained. The company aims to enable this ecosystem through partnerships with existing service providers, integrating their offerings into Ejari's platform. The company is also expanding its focus to include commercial segments such as offices, shops, malls, and even industrial spaces later this year. 'The plan is to start activating different types of rent in the offices, shops, malls, as well as the industrial sector,' Al-Shamsi said, adding that the company balances growth with operational focus to ensure it doesn't 'have our efforts captured around too many things, then the value of that doesn't become additive.' To drive its customer acquisition strategy, Ejari is leveraging real estate marketplaces. Al-Shamsi cited an ongoing partnership with a platform he described as 'the local version of Property Finder in Dubai,' which has an 80 percent market share and 3 million unique monthly visitors. Ejari's recent $14.65 million seed round reflects growing investor interest in Saudi Arabia's maturing proptech sector. Alongside Partners for Growth, BECO Capital, and Alinma Pay, other investors included Rua Ventures, anb seed, Vision Ventures, and Aqar platform. The round, held in October, comprised both equity and debt, with the latter provided by California-based PFG. The capital will be used to enhance its core technology platform, scale team capabilities, and expand into value-added services. Looking ahead, Al-Shamsi said the company's immediate focus for the first half of 2025 is to deepen market penetration and build internal capacity. 'The focus remains on the current product in a very big way,' he said. 'Growing the team, building capabilities, building the technical capabilities that we need to be able to expand to whatever we want to.' While the company's default rates remain high — hovering at 13 percent to 15 percent — Al-Shamsi appeared undeterred, stating that this was due to a planned and carefully executed strategy to test the market. 'But again, when we started, we thought that this play would be mainly in the major cities. But surprisingly, the market takes you where it wants to go. We have demands from small villages, small cities in the north and south and east.' With demand increasing from both urban and rural markets and a substantial seed round now secured, Ejari is preparing to consolidate its position in Saudi Arabia's evolving rental economy. Al-Shamsi expects revenue growth to remain strong through 2025, forecasting another significant jump. 'I'd say close to that 10 times figure. But maybe 8 or 7 times.'
TechCrunch
14-05-2025
- Business
- TechCrunch
The Amazonification of Uber: Part II
Three years ago, I wrote about the Amazonification of Uber, an evolution of the transportation company into a closed business loop that feeds customers back into other Uber channels. At the time, the focus was on how Uber creates customer stickiness by, for example, actively cross-selling food delivery customers into grocery, and grocery into alcohol, and then alcohol back into mobility. Today, Uber appears to be moving beyond its focus on transportation and working to become a convenient super app, an aggregator of services, a daily-use lifestyle platform with its best offerings tucked behind a paywall. Case in point: Uber this week is launching its first Uber One Member Days, the company's own version of Amazon's Prime Day. Prime Day is a two-day shopping event exclusively for Amazon Prime members, a consumerist hype fest that leads people to spend more than they normally would on material objects because THE DEALS! Amazon has seen sales rise every year since launching the event in 2015, and last year, the company is estimated to have topped $14 billion in sales. Uber is a long, long way away from achieving such scale, but the potential is there given the company's global presence, logistics technology, and network of drivers – both gig and autonomous. The first Uber One Member Day goes from May 16 to 23 and promises tens of thousands of deals across Uber's own product lineup as well as its various retail and hospitality partners. Uber customers will have access to 20% off Uber Black, 30% off Uber Reserve, and 40% off Uber Comfort. Other deals include: Techcrunch event Join us at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot for our leading AI industry event with speakers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Cohere. For a limited time, tickets are just $292 for an entire day of expert talks, workshops, and potent networking. Exhibit at TechCrunch Sessions: AI Secure your spot at TC Sessions: AI and show 1,200+ decision-makers what you've built — without the big spend. Available through May 9 or while tables last. Berkeley, CA | REGISTER NOW 3,000 Delta Skymiles points for people who've linked their Delta and Uber accounts and taken 10 trips during the week. Oura rings discounts. $20 off your next Ticketmaster purchase if you spend $3 on groceries. Free food from almost every fast food restaurant, including a Chipotle burrito, a Dunkin' Donuts iced coffee, and a 10 piece chicken nuggets from McDonald's. 'We want to create delight for Uber One members,' Sachin Kansal, Uber's chief product officer, told TechCrunch. 'This should be a great savings period for them. But also for folks who are not members right now, it's a great way for them to get an introduction into membership as they become members during this period.' Uber is always working to grow its Uber One membership base, which is at around 30 million members today. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said during the company's first-quarter earnings call last week that members 'tend to have high retention.' 'They spend three times more than non-members, as well,' Khosrowshahi said. As Uber works to aggregate more partnerships outside of food and grocery delivery (just look at its recent tie-up with Home Depot) and combine those deals with its membership program, the company is mirroring Amazon's evolution. Amazon started as a digital bookseller. Then it began selling everything. Now it also owns the infrastructure for both e-commerce and digital life, whether that's AWS cloud services or Prime Video. For many, Amazon is a way of life. With Uber One Member Days, the company is signaling that it, too, wants that kind of ubiquity. And it's betting that asset-light mobility – not packages delivered in Rivian vans – could be the next backbone of digital consumer culture.
Yahoo
10-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Joint Stock Company Kaspi.kz (KSPI): A Bull Case Theory
We came across a bullish thesis on Joint Stock Company (KSPI) on Substack by Antoni Nabzdyk. In this article, we will summarize the bulls' thesis on KSPI. Joint Stock Company (KSPI)'s share was trading at $90.86 as of May 7th. KSPI's trailing P/E was 8.69 according to Yahoo Finance. A businesswoman using her mobile device to shop on a ecommerce platform. (KSPI) is one of the most fascinating and underappreciated fintech stories in the global market today, offering a compelling case as a dominant super app in Kazakhstan. With an ecosystem that includes marketplace commerce, digital payments, lending, deposits, travel bookings, postomat delivery, and even access to government services—all within a single mobile app—Kaspi has embedded itself deeply into the daily lives of its users. Its mobile-first strategy, eschewing desktop development entirely, enables it to remain agile and rapidly deploy updates, leveraging end-to-end automation and sophisticated testing infrastructure. This focused mobile experience is central to its sticky user engagement and continued upselling opportunities, similar to how Apple retains its customers through ecosystem lock-in. The app serves both consumers and merchants through differentiated offerings and captures vast volumes of user data, which power AI-driven personalization features akin to Amazon's recommendation engine or Duolingo's user engagement experiments. Kaspi's Payments and Marketplace segments generate the highest profit margins, while the E-grocery segment is a lower-margin initiative but strategically valuable in expanding its ecosystem. Its investment into free delivery via a national network of postomats has significantly increased app usage and customer satisfaction, proving the company's strategic foresight. Financially, Kaspi is extremely sound, with a healthy balance sheet, prudent debt management, and strong profitability metrics. Its gross, operating, and profit margins are enviable and consistently improving, showcasing operational excellence and scalability. Compared to regional and global peers, Kaspi stands out with superior efficiency metrics, which should not be overlooked by investors. The company's dominant position in Kazakhstan gives it monopoly-like market power, particularly in the fintech and e-commerce verticals. With high monthly active users and virtually unmatched customer loyalty, it would be difficult for new entrants—even global players like Amazon—to make significant inroads without a disruptive strategy. Even if Kaspi were to lose market share in one vertical, its multi-pronged platform ensures resiliency through diversification, giving it a clear structural advantage in a relatively insulated market. That said, investors must consider the inherent risks of investing in emerging markets. Kaspi's filings explicitly mention geopolitical risks, terrorism, natural disasters, and other regional instabilities as material risks to operations. Kazakhstan's proximity to Russia and lack of NATO protection could present black swan geopolitical risks, although none are imminent today. Valuation scenarios further support Kaspi as a potentially undervalued growth asset. Assuming no revenue growth, the intrinsic value still sits significantly above current market prices. Modest revenue growth of 4% places the fair value around KZT 237,38, while more optimistic assumptions (15% revenue CAGR) suggest valuations north of KZT 602,05. Even conservative models like the Benjamin Graham approach imply a fair valuation between KZT 314,18 and 546,13 reinforcing the asymmetric risk/reward setup. stands out as a financially strong and highly profitable company operating within a rapidly expanding digital economy. Despite its impressive track record and ongoing growth, investors must weigh geopolitical concerns—particularly Kazakhstan's proximity to Russia and its reliance on Russian energy—when evaluating the opportunity. Although Kazakhstan is not a NATO member and maintains complex historical ties with Russia, it remains an independent nation with its own governance. While the geopolitical context raises valid concerns, strong fundamentals and growth potential continue to make it an attractive opportunity for investors who are comfortable navigating the risks inherent in emerging markets. Joint Stock Company (KSPI) is not on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 27 hedge fund portfolios held KSPI at the end of the fourth quarter which was 26 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the risk and potential of KSPI as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than KSPI but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock. READ NEXT: 8 Best Wide Moat Stocks to Buy Now and 30 Most Important AI Stocks According to BlackRock. Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey. Error while retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data
Bloomberg
06-05-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Grubhub Owner Wonder Tops $7 Billion Valuation in New Funding
Wonder, the food hall company that owns Grubhub and Blue Apron, has raised $600 million in new financing, said Chief Executive Officer Marc Lore — a deal that brings the company closer to creating what Lore calls a 'super app for mealtime.' The new funding brings the company's valuation to more than $7 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified discussing private information. The startup declined to comment on its valuation.
