On EQT Ventures’ investment in Curb, aiming to build the world’s largest virtual food court

Curbs’ table has legs, offering a culinary experience whenever and wherever you like; such as Smash for burgers and Soul bowls for bowls

Everyone has a relationship with food, and there is no bigger industry on the planet than food and agriculture with a consistent customer base close to 8 billion people. My passion to impact the food ecosystem has brought me to work within the food industry throughout my career, from expanding healthy food outlets in Sweden to work with large scale product innovation and bringing new food brands to market.

I also love to visit the local restaurants to try the latest dish on their menu, to travel the world to experience new flavors, and to experiment myself (my latest thing is to cook over open fire). Still, I live a hectic life and I admit, I am a big fan of online food delivery. Not only to get food delivered conveniently to my door, but also to try out new dishes for inspiration. And I am not alone. As we’ve witnessed with Wolt’s hyper growth, online food delivery is booming.

As software continues to eat the world (pun intended), each new major platform that emerges, gives birth to a surrounding digital ecosystem. Like Booking.com and Hotels.com were built around Google, dark kitchens are delivery only restaurants, built around the food delivery platforms like Wolt, Uber Eats, and Deliveroo.

Although the delivery platforms have experienced digital transformation, the supply side is still behind. With Covid-19 accelerating consumers’ comfort using home delivery services, this leaves a massive opportunity for dark kitchens, an industry predicted to become a $1 trillion market by 2030.

Carl, Kristian, Camilla and Felipe- aiming to build the world’s largest food court

The seasoned food delivery operators Carl, Felipe and Camilla spent years on the frontlines at Foodora and Delivery Hero. They witnessed what’s broken on the supply side; high costs, inconsistent quality, limited profitability and accessibility. To fix this, they founded the delivery-first dark kitchen Curb, together with the culinary creative Kristian.

Curb’s virtual food court, here inside the Wolt app, with all their brands in one place, great if many people are ordering different dishes

By leveraging data, tech and operational excellence, Curb aims to become the fastest food innovators, building their own food concepts and tailoring them to customers’ unique needs.

To know what brand to create next, what market to expand to, and how to increase their operational efficiency, Curb is building their own tech stack. Their secret sauce allows Curb to scale brands and kitchens efficiently.

As Curb knows they are only as good as their last meal, they have set their ambition high to support their team to produce the best possible food with an inspiring work environment and opportunities to grow, to ultimately become the first choice for professionals looking to develop in the industry.

With the €3.2 million Seed round in the books, the team is set to go for aggressive growth across Europe. Considering that Curb became one of the top online restaurants in the Nordics just a few months after launch, we’re beyond excited to support Curb’s journey to capture the opportunity to shape the future of online food delivery.

Lastly, a big shout out to my colleague Ted for working together on Curb, and to Fredrik Hjelm for the intro 🙏

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Fancy tasting the future of food? Visit Curb’s virtual food court and order your next meal (Indecisive? Try my favourite El Vego Burrito😋)