Just Eat to be bought by investment group Prosus in £3.4bn deal

Just Eat Takeaway.com is set to be bought by a Dutch technology investor in a deal worth around 4.1 billion euros (£3.4 billion).

Prosus, which is majority-owned by South Africa’s Naspers, is planning to offer 20.30 euros (£16.85) a share to buy the takeaway delivery giant with aims to create a “European tech champion”.

Prosus already owns a 28% stake in Just Eat rival Delivery Hero.

The planned all-cash offer comes after a difficult past few years for Amsterdam-based Just Eat, which had enjoyed booming business – and a soaring share price – during the pandemic when households were forced to eat at home, but saw trading and its stock price pare bask sharply when lockdowns ended.

Jitse Groen, chief executive and founder of Just Eat Takeaway.com, said: “Just Eat Takeaway.com is now a faster growing, more profitable and predominantly European-based business.

“Prosus fully supports our strategic plans and its extensive resources will help to further accelerate our investments and growth across food, groceries, fintech and other adjacencies. We are looking forward to an exciting future together.”

Just Eat Takeaway.com will continue to be based in Amsterdam under its current name and will maintain its key brands following the deal, the group confirmed.

Prosus chief executive Fabricio Bloisi said he expects to grow the number of full-time workers Just Eat Takeaway.com employs and its number of couriers.

He said the deal will “create more jobs in many dimensions, more jobs in the technology sector, but also more jobs with restaurants and more opportunities for drivers too”.

“As we grow, the opportunity is to create more jobs… That’s the mood we have in Europe now, and that’s the mood we need in Europe now – invest to grow and create opportunities. That’s what we are doing.”

Mr Bloisi declined to give numbers on employee or courier headcount.

When asked if he could provide guarantees on couriers’ working conditions, Mr Bloisi added: “We are committing to keeping the way this operates today that is quite well recognised around Europe.”

“Also, we are going to add new technology to try to make the deliveries more efficient and to try to help the growth. But our intention is not to enter and change everything.”

Prosus said it would be the fourth largest food delivery group in the world following the takeover.

Mr Bloisi added: “We are excited for Just Eat Takeaway.com to join the Prosus Group and the opportunity to create a European tech champion.

“Prosus already has an extensive food delivery portfolio outside of Europe and a proven track record of profitable growth through investment in our customer and driver experiences, restaurant partnerships, and world-class logistics, powered by innovation and artificial intelligence.”

Prosus can combine its “strong technical and investment capabilities” to Just Eat’s strong position in key European markets, it added.

Prosus already has a food business spanning 70 countries, with full ownership of Latin American food delivery platform iFood, as well as the stake in Delivery Hero, a 4% holding in global food delivery giant Meituan and a 25% stake in India’s recently floated food and grocery delivery platform, Swiggy.

It has had its sights on Just Eat for many years, having lost out to Netherlands-based firm Takeaway.com in the battle to buy Just Eat in early 2020.

Since then, Just Eat bought US food-ordering platform Grubhub in an ill-fated deal, paying 7.3 billion US dollars (£5.8 billion) at the height of the takeaway boom in 2021, only to offload the business for 650 million dollars (£514 million) last November.

Just Eat also delisted from the London Stock Exchange last December to focus on its Amsterdam listing amid cost-cutting efforts.

Prosus said it expects to make its offer “as soon as practically possible”, which is likely to be in the second quarter, with a view to completing the deal by the end of the year.

In full year results also released on Monday, Just Eat revealed annual net losses of 1.65 billion euro (£1.37 billion) after taking a further one billion euro (£829 million) write-down on the Grubhub business.

Excluding write-downs, pre-tax losses narrowed to 532 million euro (£441 million) from 685 million euro (£568 million) in 2023.