Singapore’s ride-hailing and food delivery company Grab is expanding its services beyond ride and food delivery by doubling down on the competitive restaurant booking industry in Southeast Asia.
Grab confirmed to TechCrunch that it acquired a Singapore-based dining reservation platform, Chope, for an undisclosed amount.
Grab already offers restaurant reservations in Singapore by way of its acquisition of HungryGoWhere in 2022. With 13,000 eateries on Chope across Singapore and beyond — Chope has operations in Hong Kong, China (Shanghai and Beijing), Indonesia (Bali and Jakarta), and Thailand (Bangkok and Phuket) — Grab will be expanding that business significantly in the hope of better differentiating itself from competitors and improving margins.
A Chope spokesperson said that the dining booking platform had been seeking new investment when the acquisition offer came up.
“We evaluated potential buyers and found the best fit with Grab — a company with a mission aligned to ours in connecting restaurants to diners,” the spokesperson at Chope told TechCrunch.
Founded in 2011, Chope had raised just over $64 million from investors that included Alipay parent Ant Group and Singha Ventures, the corporate venture arm of the brewing giant, according to PitchBook data, which estimated that its valuation was around $101 million in 2022.
Grab emailed its staff on Monday to inform them that it had closed an acquisition deal with Chope. Grab said it would acquire Southeast Asia operations except for China and Hong Kong services. The Business Times first reported the news, citing an internal mail.
The Singaporean “super app” will be able to offer restaurant booking services in Southeast Asia through the acquisition, differentiating it from its peers like GoTo and Line Man Wongnai. A spokesperson at Grab told TechCrunch that it expects to provide more synergies for its [food and beverages] merchants-partners to help them capture online-to-offline opportunities via Chope acquisition.
“The vast majority of the merchants on our platform are small, medium-sized businesses who don’t have the same resources or know-how that big F&B brands have. Our focus is to help level the playing field for them through tools that empower them to grow and manage their businesses more efficiently,” the Grab spokesperson said in an email statement.
The restaurant reservation space is very crowded in Southeast Asia. Users can also use apps like Open Table, Eat App, Yelp, Oddle, Resy, Tock, Odette, Quandoo and Eatigo to make restaurant reservations in Asia. And in 2022, Grab shareholder Uber launched a new feature, Uber Explore, allowing users in 15 cities across the U.S. and Mexico to book dinner reservations and live events through the app.
The fact that there are so many options out there now begs the question of whether this latest deal is a signal of more M&A and consolidation to come, or whether Grab has simply grabbed a specific opportunity.
