This week the BIG5D Podcast welcomes grubtech Co-founder and CEO Mohamed Al Fayed. Grubtech is emerging as a key infrastructure player in the UAE’s exploding ghost kitchen scene.
Dubai-based grubtech (founded in 2019) doesn’t operate virtual restaurants. The company has built an operating system to address the friction points arising from running a high-volume food delivery business. Its software provides the efficiency needed to serve multiple delivery-only brands from a single location.
The BIG5D Podcast · Episode 18: Mohamed Al Fayed, Grubtech
“Our key takeaway from studying the space was that there was no out-of-the-box or native-built technology to power these operations,” Mohamed said.
While MENA-based, grubtech has global ambitions. Mohamed tells us the company currently has active customers in more than seven counties. Outside of MENA, grubtech has customers in Singapore and Pakistan, with plans to add Malaysia and the Philippines soon. He says the company is in talks to expand into Europe and North America as well.
In March, grubtech announced a $3.4 million pre-Series A funding round to fuel its product development and expansion. This followed a $2 million seed round in mid-2020.
Our conversation goes pretty deep into the mechanics of ghost kitchens. And we learned about some interesting new trends along the way. One is micro-cloud kitchens. That’s when a local restaurant uses its excess capacity to fulfill delivery orders for another dining brand. So the space operates along both distributed and concentrated models.
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