Telecommunications firm SoftBank’s Vision Fund has entered talks to invest approximately $300m in US-based local delivery services provider DoorDash, Recode reported yesterday, citing sources familiar with the deal.
Founded in 2013, DoorDash provides last-mile logistics for restaurants and, partnering some 40,000 local outlets and more than 50 national chains such as Taco Bell, Five Guys and Subway, in more than 300 cities across the US.
The company uses a network of more than 75,000 freelance ‘Dashers’ to make deliveries, and agreed a deal last week to be the official delivery partner for burger chain Wendy’s across 48 US markets.
DoorDash was valued at $720m as of its last funding round, a $127m series C in March 2016 led by venture capital firm Sequoia Capital with participation from Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), Y Combinator and Wellcome Trust.
KPCB had led a $40m series B round for DoorDash in March 2015 that included Sequoia Capital, Khosla Ventures, and CRV. The company has raised approximately $187m in total and its investors also include Pear Ventures and private investors including Ted Zagat.
SoftBank Vision Fund is in negotiations with the company but a possible barrier to the deal could be its prospective investment in ride hailing platform Uber, which owns DoorDash rival UberEats.