Meal delivery company Just Eat Takeaway.com has accepted a bid from tech investor Prosus for a full takeover. The bid of 20.3 euros per share values the delivery giant at more than four billion euros.
Much higher than closing price
According to the press release from the Dutch investor, the bid is 63 % higher than the closing price on the stock exchange on Friday evening, and 49 % above the weighted average price of the past three months. The management board and supervisory board of JET unanimously support the bid.
Prosus is already a giant in the food delivery sector, as it fully owns Latin America’s largest delivery company iFood and has a 28 % stake in German Delivery Hero. Its takeover of Just Eat Takeaway.com would create one of the world’s largest food delivery companies. However, JET will continue to exist as a separate entity and all major brands would be retained.
Long shared history
The two companies share a long history: in 2019, Prosus bid against Takeaway.com in the takeover battle for British Just Eat, but lost out to Jitse Groen’s company. Remarkably, its offer of 6.4 billion euros for the British meal delivery service was much more than the amount it now needs to acquire the combination Just Eat Takeaway.com. In 2022, Prosus did take over the previously mentioned iFood… from Just Eat Takeaway.
Just Eat Takeaway.com is active in seventeen international markets, from Australia to Canada, in almost all of Western Europe and even in Asia. According to its own statement, it connects 61 million customers with more than 356,000 local partners.
Lower turnover
In one go, JET also announced its operating results for 2024. Its gross transaction volume fell by 2 % to 26.3 billion euros, a decline that was mainly caused by North America. As a result, group turnover also fell by 1 % to 5.085 billion euros. The profit figures showed the opposite movement: adjusted EBITDA rose from 339 to 460 million euros, while the net loss decreased from 1.846 to 1.645 billion euros.
For 2025, JET predicts a drop in gross profit to around 370 million euros. The European gross transaction volume would increase somewhere between 4 and 8 %, the company does not announce any forecasts for the rest of the world.
