Meiweibuyongdeng, the China-based developer of a restaurant booking management platform, has received RMB400m ($63.1m) in series D1 funding from e-commerce firm Alibaba and travel agency Ctrip, China Money Network reported on Friday.
Founded in 2013, Meiweibuyongdeng has built an online platform that enables restaurants to issue customers with waiting numbers in order to help them prepare and send out food more efficiently.
The system also gives customers the chance to do other things while they wait for their food. Meiweibuyongdeng intends to open its first shared kitchen, which will enable customers to connect to each other and jointly order food, in the city of Shanghai next month.
The company, which is also known as 9Now, additionally plans to make strategic investments in supply chain and hardware technology developers in the restaurant industry.
Meiweibuyongdeng has partnerships in place with about 100,000 restaurants across more than 200 Chinese cities. The round valued it at approximately $630m, according to China Renaissance, which was the adviser on the deal.
Koubei, the local services platform owned by Alibaba, co-led a series C+ round of undisclosed size for the company with asset manager Zhongzhi Capital in January 2017 that valued it at just over $430m.
Dianping, the local services platform that is now part of Meituan Dianping, had joined internet group Baidu, Matrix Partners and undisclosed additional investors for Meiweibuyongdeng’s $78.6m series C round in 2015.
Matrix Partners had supplied an undisclosed amount of series A funding for Meiweibuyongdeng in 2013, before the company raised $20m from Matrix Partners and Tiantu Capital in a 2014 series B round.