Just Eat plc Strong growth and strategic investments saw more than four million new customers

Just Eat plc (LON: JE), a leading global hybrid marketplace for online food delivery, today announces its full year results for the 12 months ended 31 December 2018.

Financial highlights

Key highlights

Strong financial performance

●    Revenue up 43% ahead of prior year; uEBITDA¹ up 6% after investing £51 million in strategic initiatives

●    26 million active customers driving strong order growth of 28% to 221 million

●    Outstanding SkipTheDishes growth in Canada reaching full national coverage and uEBITDA breakeven during Q4

●    Strong UK growth with orders up 17%; consolidated #1 UK position through successful integration of HungryHouse

●    Targeted roll-out of delivery in Australia and UK demonstrating a clear route to profitability

Significant strategic progress in FY18 enabling us to take advantage of £83 billion market opportunity

●    Creating a leading hybrid offering founded on our unrivalled marketplace, combined with the targeted roll-out of delivery

●    SkipTheDishes technology integrated and powering delivery in Australia and the UK

●    Investing in the customer, partner and courier experience through technology & product with order frequency up 5%

●    Partnering with all leading Quick Service Restaurants including McDonald’s, KFC, Tim Hortons, Hungry Jack’s and Subway

●    Acquisition of Flyt, a leading restaurant software platform which improves restaurant efficiency and customer experience

Good progress across all geographies in FY18

●    UK revenue up 27% despite the impact of exceptionally hot weather in July and August

●    Canada revenue up 186% at constant currency with launch of multilingual capabilities and new Branded Restaurants

●    Australia & New Zealand revenue flat at constant currency as we focused on successful integration of delivery

●    International revenue up 31% at constant currency driven by strong order growth in Italy, Spain and France

●    iFood continued to grow rapidly with total orders up 103% after increased investment in brand and delivery

Outlook
In 2019, we will leverage the improvements we have made in our marketplace business to drive order and revenue growth, while we now also expect to grow marketplace uEBITDA margins year on year. Furthermore, we anticipate 2019 will see our Canadian business, SkipTheDishes, report its first full year uEBITDA profit, demonstrating the route to profitability for delivery. We will invest this increased profit in accelerating our other exciting delivery initiatives along the pathway towards profitability, principally in the UK and Australia. The targeted roll-out of delivery in key zones will allow us to increase our overall customer base and serve even more brilliant food moments. 

The Board expects to report full year 2019 revenue in the range of £1.0 billion to £1.1 billion and uEBITDA  in the range of £185 million to £205 million (both excluding Brazil and Mexico). Under iFood’s latest plan, the Board expects Just Eat’s share³ of its Latin American operations (being Brazil and Mexico together) to report an uEBITDA loss in the range of £80 million to £100 million. Just Eat will fully participate in funding iFood’s exciting growth plans, maintaining its shareholding.

Peter Duffy, Interim Chief Executive Officer, commented:

“Just Eat’s continued strong growth and strategic investments saw more than four million new customers join us in 2018. We are creating a leading hybrid offering founded on our unrivalled marketplace, combined with the targeted roll-out of delivery. This gives our growing customer base access to the greatest choice of restaurants and drives even more orders to our Restaurant Partners, ultimately strengthening the network effects of our business. We have a clear plan for the year ahead as our highly experienced team works hard to accelerate the execution of our strategy and we remain focused on long-term returns for shareholders.”

 

Mike Evans, Chair, said:

“The Board is pleased to see that the strategy set out last year is working and already delivering strong results. Our experienced management team, led by Peter Duffy, is working to accelerate the implementation of that strategy. Our leading hybrid marketplace gives Just Eat a real competitive advantage and we are pleased with the speed at which this is now being rolled out. The Board’s search to identify Just Eat’s next permanent CEO is underway and we will provide a further update when a decision has been taken.”