Uber Buys ezCater for $2.3B to Push Deeper Into Workplace Catering

Uber has agreed to acquire ezCater, a U.S. marketplace for catering and workplace meals, in an all-cash deal worth $2.3 billion. The move extends Uber’s push to broaden what its Uber Eats division can offer beyond restaurant takeout and grocery delivery.

Founded in 2007, ezCater operates much like a booking engine for large-group food orders, connecting businesses that need to feed a room full of people with restaurants able to handle that volume. Uber says the company processed more than $2.5 billion in gross bookings over the past 12 months. For a business that spent its first seven years self-funded before raising a $4 million round in 2014, the sale marks a major exit.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi framed the purchase as a way to open a new revenue channel for restaurants, describing catering as a large business that can generate meaningful income for food operators. In his view, Uber’s scale can expose that service to a far wider customer base and help restaurants capture more of these higher-value orders.

The acquisition follows a string of similar moves by Uber to expand its delivery operations. The company is already in the process of buying Delivery Hero for $15 billion and has been investing in and partnering with drone delivery players such as Zipline and Flytrex. Together, these efforts suggest Uber is positioning its delivery arm as a logistics network for goods and services well beyond a single meal ordered by an individual.

Workplace catering carries different economics than consumer delivery: order values are typically higher, demand is scheduled in advance rather than on impulse, and corporate clients can become recurring customers. That combination is attractive to a platform looking to grow average order size without necessarily adding huge numbers of new consumers. It also places Uber in closer competition with companies serving corporate food and events, an area where reliability and scale matter as much as selection.