Getir in talks to take over German grocery app rival Flink

Grocery delivery app pioneer Getir is in talks to take over its lossmaking German rival Flink, according to people familiar with the deal, as consolidation accelerates in one of the pandemic’s hottest tech sectors.

The discussions between the two European groups are continuing and there is no guarantee of an agreement being reached, the people said.

The talks come almost five months after Getir, the Istanbul-based online grocery start-up, closed its acquisition of Berlin-based rival Gorillas in a $1.2bn deal that valued the combined group at $10bn.

Flink is one of Europe’s last remaining independent grocery delivery groups after a wave of consolidation over the past year, as capital-intensive businesses have fallen out of favour with investors given rising interest rates and the risk of a looming recession.

Founded in Berlin in 2020, Flink in January said it expects its core German business to be profitable by the end of 2023, after hitting €400mn in sales in 2022. The entire business, including subsidiaries in France and the Netherlands that launched last year, would be profitable by the fourth quarter of 2024, it added.

Both Getir and Flink share a common investor in Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Company.

Flink is also in talks to raise around $100mn of funding from its existing investors at a valuation of more than $1bn, according to people familiar with the effort.

That would mark a comedown from late 2021, when the firm raised $750mn of financing at a $2.1bn valuation, before taking the new funding into account.

Getir and Flink declined to comment.

After more than a dozen rapid grocery apps — which promised to deliver groceries and convenience-store items in as little as 10 minutes — launched in the US and Europe by mid-2021, only a handful of players now remain.

Several smaller rapid delivery apps have either sold or pivoted their business models. In 2021, Getir acquired UK-based Weezy while US-based Gopuff bought Dija and Fancy and DoorDash invested in Germany’s Flink.

Getir’s acquisition of Gorillas in December brought together two of the most prominent start-ups to expand across Europe over the past two years. A merger between Getir and Flink would leave US-based Gopuff as one of the last big players in the sector.

As competition lessens, investors in the surviving players remain optimistic that cash-rich, time-poor consumers will still be prepared to pay a premium for the convenience of fast delivery of daily essentials, even at a time of high inflation.