Uber unveiled its earnings this week for the fourth quarter of 2020. Its food delivery business remains the strongest part of the business, a point hardly surprising since we’re still in the midst of a pandemic and restaurant dining rooms remain closed in many places.
A few of the latest stats, according to the company earnings call yesterday, include:
- Uber reported $3.17 billion in total revenue from October through December, 2020.
- Q4 gross bookings for delivery grew 128 percent and reached a $44 billion run rate in December.
- Revenue “more than tripled” from last year and grew 19 percent compared to the third quarter of 2020.
On this week’s call, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi also called out Uber’s plans to expand delivery into areas beyond traditional restaurants. “It’s become clear that the pandemic has increased consumers’ appetite for on-demand delivery of not just food, but all goods, and we take a major step to address this enormous opportunity,” he said.
Recent(ish) acquisitions by Uber support that statement. At the end of 2019, the company acquired majority ownership of online grocery Cornershop and in 2020 expanded its grocery delivery services. Uber’s more recent $2.65 billion acquisition of rival service Postmates gives it access to the latter’s delivery-as-a-service business that connects customers with Walmart, 7-Eleven, Apple, and other stores. Just last week, Uber also nabbed alcohol-delivery service Drizly.
“These new initiatives will remain an investment priority going forward,” Khosrowshahi said on the call.
Overall, Uber’s losses are narrowing. For all of 2020, net losses totaled $6.77 billion, which is a roughly 20 percent improvement from the $8.51 billion in 2019.
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