Citing internal data, Leiphone.com reported that Meituan’s daily food delivery orders reached 90 million this month.
Meituan, the Chinese on-demand delivery giant, is maintaining a steady hold on its 70 per cent market share in domestic food delivery, despite intensifying competition from JD.com and Alibaba Group Holding’s Ele.me, as daily orders reached 90 million in recent days, according to a report by Chinese tech media outlet Leiphone.com, citing internal data.
Meituan did not comment on the report. If confirmed, it would show the challenges Meituan’s rivals face in changing consumer habits, after a price war broke out in the instant delivery market amid sluggish consumer spending in the world’s second-largest economy.
Daily orders on JD.com’s rival service have reached 25 million, the company announced on June 18. It launched a food delivery service in February, expanding its instant delivery offering, which aims to bring items to customers’ doors typically within an hour. Alibaba said last month that the combined daily orders on Ele.me and its Taobao Instant Commerce reached 40 million. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.
Leiphone reported the numbers based on “exclusively obtained” Meituan data. The delivery giant, founded by entrepreneur Wang Xing in 2010, has not publicly disclosed operational data.
Since entering the food delivery market, JD.com’s billionaire founder Richard Liu Qiangdong has been aggressively recruiting delivery crew, even donning a delivery uniform himself and sharing hotpot with couriers.
Alibaba has leveraged its Ele.me couriers to break into instant commerce, which launched as a service on the Taobao app in May.
The aggressive moves from the tech giants have also included subsidies and promotions in attempts to woo consumers away from Meituan, which has long dominated food and instant delivery in China.
In 2024, Meituan held 65 per cent of the food delivery market, with Ele.me a distant second at 33 per cent, according to Bocom International. That left just 2 per cent of the market for all other competing platforms combined.
Meituan’s revenue reached 86.6 billion yuan (US$12 billion) in the first quarter, with net profit rising 87.3 per cent year on year to 10 billion yuan.
With growth opportunities slowing in its home market, Meituan has been expanding globally through its Keeta brand. It has quickly become a dominant food delivery player in Hong Kong since launching two years ago, capturing 44 per cent of the market, according to a March 2024 survey by data provider Measurable AI.
Keeta has since launched in Saudi Arabia, and Meituan has plans to launch it in Brazil in the coming months, with an investment of US$1 billion over five years.
JD.com chairman Liu said at a briefing Tuesday that the company will unveil a new food delivery model next month, differentiating it from Meituan, and promised to address food safety concerns while offering consumers more affordable options.
Meituan’s Hong Kong-listed shares fell 3.75 per cent on Thursday to HK$128.3.
Source: SCMP
