Shares of DoorDash Gained More than 15% Before the Bell

On Wednesday, shares of DoorDash jumped more than 15% before the bell as the company announced it will acquire Wolt. DoorDash decided to buy Wolt, a food delivery platform that’s expanded into groceries as well as retail, in an all-stock transaction valued at $8.1 billion. The move is an effort to accelerate DoorDash’s international growth. 

The history of Wolt dates back to 2014. Miki Kuusi founded Wolt, who, upon the deal closing, will run DoorDash and report to Tony Xu. Currently, Wolt has more than 4,000 employees across 23 countries. The company’s technology enables users to easily discover and receive food via Wolt’s platform. The company based in Finland raised more than $850 million to date. Wolt’s most recent funding round was $530 million in January, led by Iconiq Growth. Tiger Global, KKR, DST, Prosus, EQT Growth, and Coatue also participated in the funding round.

Wort represents the on-demand delivery giant’s sixth acquisition and its second in 2021. Earlier this year, DoorDash acquired Chowbotics. The deal mentioned above is expected to close in the first half of 2022.

DoorDash and its financial results

DoorDash announced its decision regarding Wolt as part of its third-quarter earnings report. The company reported a net loss of $101 million. Unfortunately, that’s more than double its loss of $43 million in the same quarter of 2020.

It was one of the benefactors of the stay-at-home trend. People relied on food delivery services while taking precautions to minimize the spread of coronavirus.

The company from San Francisco said the number of new consumers acquired in the third quarter declined compared to peak levels in 2020. Nonetheless, the number of new customers remains “well above” levels in 2019 as well as in prior years, DoorDash added. In the third quarter, total orders jumped 47% to 347 million. 

Its customers were spending more money on orders during the third quarter. Interestingly, Marketplace’s gross order value jumped 44% to 10.4 billion. On-demand delivery giant expects a range of $10.3 billion to $10.7 billion in the last quarter of the year. 

More than 3 million people provided services in the quarter to earn more than $2.8 billion. DoorDash also reported 500,000 partner merchants, saying it continues to add at a pace that is faster than pre-pandemic levels. 

Adjusted EBITDA or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization reached $86 million in the quarter. DoorDash expects a range of $0 million to $100 million in the fourth quarter. 

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