Food delivery app trend takes hold in Taiwan

2014-08-28

Taiwan is the latest country to join the growing global trend of embracing apps aimed at providing local foodies with more convenient delivery services.

“Foodpanda,” an app owned by a German company and operating out of Singapore, partners with a network of 500 Taiwan restaurants and boasts a team of over 100 delivery professionals. It provides services in Hsinchu, Kaohsiung, Taichung, New Taipei and Taipei cities.

App CEO Ron Chan said Taiwan’s dine-out and food delivery sector offers great potential, with consumers averaging 4.5 such services per week. “Business growth has been in the triple digits every three months since we began operations in Taiwan two years ago.”

Statistics from the Ministry of Economic Affairs shows locals spent over NT$430 billion (US$14.32 billion) on dine-out and food delivery services last year.

According to Chan, partner restaurants are benefitting handsomely from the collaboration, with some citing increases of 25 percent in revenues. “We are planning to build on this healthy state of affairs and tie-up with more local outfits as demand increases,” he said.

Other apps proving similarly popular include “GrubHub” in the U.S. and “Just Eat” in the U.K. The former allows diners to order from 30,000 restaurants in more than 700 cities, while the latter boasts over 13,000 throughout Britain.

Source: Taiwan Today (http://taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=221083&CtNode=413)