Food and last-mile deliveries top Careem's business trends in 2021

Daily food orders in the UAE jump 90% from last year as 1,016 restaurants join its platform, while e-commerce unit surges 250%

Careem, the Middle East's first unicorn, has grown significantly from its beginnings as a ride-hailing service. Reuters

Careem, the Dubai multi-service web platform, said food and last-mile deliveries and e-commerce unit topped its business trends in 2021, on the back of economic recovery and with more users turning to online services for their daily needs.

The Middle East's first unicorn – a start-up with a valuation above $1 billion – said in its annual trends report that daily food orders in the UAE jumped 90 per cent from last year, helped by the addition of 1,016 restaurants. Saudi fast-food chain Al Baik remained its most popular restaurant in 2021.

Last-mile deliveries – the movement of goods from a transport centre to the final delivery destination – at Careem Express leapt 150 per cent from January to November, with its e-commerce arm surging 250 per cent. Last month's Black Friday sales bonanza was the peak period with daily deliveries exceeding 45,000.

“This year, we started simplifying the lives of people in more ways than just seamless transportation ... proving that the opportunity to simplify people’s lives with the convenience of one app is huge and we are just at the beginning of our journey," Mudassir Sheikha, chief executive and co-founder of Careem, said on Wednesday.

The UAE's e-commerce market significantly grew after the pandemic as more consumers turned to online channels for their shopping needs. The sector grew 53 per cent to a record $3.9bn in 2020 and is expected to grow further, the Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry said in June.

This strength is expected to result in the Emirates overtaking the UK in e-commerce adoption with both brands and users expanding their online activity, industry leaders said at the World Chambers Congress in Dubai last month.

Cash-on-delivery payments in the UAE are also 75 per cent lower as more consumers opt to pay online or through contactless methods, a joint study from Dubai Police, Dubai Economy and Visa revealed earlier this year.

Abdulrahman Tarabzouni, chief executive of STV, which in 2018 took part in a $200 million fund raising that valued Careem at $1.8bn, according to Crunchbase. Courtesy: STV

In 2016, Careem had been valued at $650m when it raised $350m from a group including Saudi Telecom Company. Courtesy: Saudi Telecom Co

Dany Farha , CEO & Managing Partner, of Beco Capital. The Dubai based VC fund was one of the early investors in Careem back in 2014. Photo: Pawan Singh / The National

Rakuten, the $9 billion Japanese e-commerce company, also became an investor in Careem in 2016. Photo: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg

The Kingdom Tower, operated by Kingdom Holding Company, stands alongside palm trees in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Prince Alwaleed bin Talal's firm Kingdom first invested in Careem in 2017 and then again in October. Photo: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg

Abdullah Al Dawood, MD and CEO of Al Tayyar Travel Group, talks to the press at Arabian Travel Market (ATM) in Dubai. Saudi Arabia's Al Tayyar is Careem's largest corporate shareholder, having got involved back in 2014. On Tuesday, Al Tayyar said its exit value is 1.78bn Saudi riyals (Dh1.74bn). Photo: Reem Mohammed/ The National

A logo of Didi Chuxing is displayed on a building in Hangzhou in China's eastern Zhejiang province. The Chinese ride-hailing firm made an undisclosed investment in Careem in 2017. Photo: STR / AFP

The Mercedes star is illuminated on the headquarters of Daimler in Stuttgart. The German luxury carmaker Daimler took part in a $150m capital raise for Careem in 2017 when it was valued at $1.1bn - making Careem a so called 'unicorn', the name for tech start-ups that reach the $1bn mark. Photo: THOMAS KIENZLE / AFP

David Chao, co-founder and general partner at DCM Ventures, the Silicon Valley investor, which also came in on Careem in 2017. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Philippe Laffont, the founder of New York VC fund Coatue Management, which also became an investor in Careem in 2017.

Fadi Ghandour, executive chairman of Wamda Group and founder of Aramex, had been a member of Careem's board. Wamda has been an investor in Careem since 2015. Photo: Pawan Singh / The National

Emirati businesswoman Muna Al Gurg, director at Easa Saleh Al Gurg Group and chairwoman of the Young Arab Leaders, invested in Careem in 2016. Photo: Reem Mohammed / The National

Ride-hailing services, Careem's first business, grew 28 per cent from 2020 as it conducted more than five million trips. Around 1.6 per cent, or 22,677, of trips from October to mid-December were made to and from the Expo 2020 Dubai site, Careem said. The longest trip was 635-kilometre from Dubai to Abu Dhabi and back. Around 130,000 customers used its city-to-city service from Dubai to the six other emirates.

Careem last month reported that it registered 4.3 million rides in the first 10 months of 2021, and more than 23 million between 2015 and 2019.

Its Bike segment, Expo 2020 Dubai's exclusive micro-mobility provider, doubled to around 830,000 trips year-to-date, serving more than 122,000 users. The number of bicycles in service in Dubai and Abu Dhabi doubled to 2,000.

The company's digital payments service, Careem Pay, posted more than 90,000 peer-to-peer transactions in the UAE. Across Careem's six core markets, transactions were at over 66 million, with Pakistan recording the highest usage at around 122,000 transactions worth $8.8 million. Careem Pay also introduced bill payments for telecom operators Etisalat and du this year.

We started simplifying the lives of people in more ways than just seamless transportation ... proving that the opportunity to simplify people’s lives with the convenience of one app is huge and we are just at the beginning of our journey

Mudassir Sheikha,
chief executive and co-founder of Careem

In its grocery segment, fruits and vegetables was the most popular category, and in excess of 610,000 litres of water were ordered. Careem's most loyal customer ordered 365 times this year – more than one order a day – and the highest single-order receipt was Dh3,243.

The "laziest" market for food ordering was Pakistan, with one in every six orders less than 1 kilometre away, according to Careem.

Careem's customers donated $370,000 towards social causes through its rewards programme, the company said, with the highest donations coming from the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. And the highest value went to the UN World Food Programme’s Share the Meal campaign.

The company became a unicorn in 2019 after Uber of the US purchased it for $3.1bn. Last month, the UAE said it aims to become home to 20 unicorns by 2031 as part of a programme to attract and expand small and medium enterprises.