Deliveroo takes bite out of Just Eat's market as food fight hots up

From next month, Deliveroo, which works with more than 10,000 restaurants in the UK, is to sign up a further 5,000 eateries who use their own delivery fleet.

Until now, only restaurants that agreed to use Deliveroo’s network of 15,000 couriers could be listed on its takeaway app.

It expects to take on thousands more riders to offer restaurants with their own fleet the option of using its couriers at busy times.

Chief executive Will Shu said: “We are giving restaurants with their own fleets of riders the chance to be on our platform and to use our rider network whenever they need it.

“This is a major development for the company that will mean thousands of new restaurants delivering new orders to new customers and it’s part of our mission to become the definitive food company.”

The new initiative, dubbed Marketplace+, means that from July Deliveroo will have 5,000 extra outlets on its platform.

Deliveroo currently works with around 10,000 restaurants, and said that Marketplace+ will help smaller local outlets extend their delivery offer.