 "UberEats. Photo: UberEats Twitter handle")
Cab-hailing app Uber on Wednesday said it is committed to making "serious investments" in its food delivery offering, UberEATS in the Indian market but is also mindful of ensuring profitability of the business.
The company, which introduced UberEATS in India six months ago, has already expanded the service to seven Indian cities, including Mumbai, Delhi-NCR and Hyderabad.
"We are heavily investing in the Indian market. You can see that by the way we have expanded in a very short time. At the same time, we are also mindful of profitability," Jason Droege, Head of UberEverything, said.
He added that in July 2017, out of the 108 cities where UberEATS was available, it was profitable in 27 of them.
Currently, they are in 180 cities and Uber aims to expand this to 200 by end of this year.
"The focus of our investment is to ensure we have a good operating team on ground and strong technology that supports it. Food delivery is logistically complicated. Our experience from the rides business comes handy here," he explained.
UberEATS was started in 2014 as a small delivery pilot in Los Angeles and was later launched as a separate mobile app in Toronto in December 2015.
In India, UberEATS competes with the likes of Zomato, FoodPanda and Swiggy.
It currently has over 5,000 restaurant-partners on its platform. It has launched the service in Hyderabad on Wednesday where it has partnered with more than 300 restaurants across the city.
Droege said the company is also working on bringing in innovation to enhance customer experience.
"We introduced cash payments for UberEATS in Mumbai recently. Like rides, this was a global first. We will look at expanding the cash facility depending on the response we get," he added.
He said UberEATS has gained great momentum in India and is one of its fastest growing markets in the Asia Pacific region.
