Quick Take — Walmart expands into home delivery: partnership with three fast-food chains

Retail giantWalmart Inc.is expanding its restaurant food home-delivery service beyond its own stores for the first time. According to initial reports fromBloomberg, the retailer will begin offering delivery in 30 minutes or less for Papa John’s orders in thousands of locations across the United States, following a brief pilot scheme in selected markets this autumn.

Hungry customers will be able to order from the pizza chain, which offers home delivery and takeaway, via walmart.com or the Walmart mobile app, in the section dedicated to restaurants. Meals can be ordered individually or added to the online shopping basket alongside other items, using Walmart’sExpress deliveryservice. Deliveries will be carried out by independent couriers via the Spark Delivery app…

Other partner restaurants that have signed delivery agreements with Walmart include theSubway sandwich chainand Dunkin’, through a partnership with their parent company, Inspire Brands…

Progressive Grocer

Below: Subway is a sandwich chain that is very popular in Anglo-Saxon countries. Dunkin’ Donuts is such a strong brand that, in addition to its fast-food outlets, it also has own-brand products distributed through US supermarket chains.

Quick Take — China: instant retail – ‘quick commerce’ – is set to reach $178 billion by the end of the year

according to the government.

Its competitors are Meituan, JD.com and Alibaba, which spent billions of dollars on vouchers, free deliveries and incentives for retailers last year.

Now, so-called ‘instant commerce’ has established itself as the new battleground for online shopping. Whilst the companies’ spending spree has channelled billions in drinks towards budget-conscious consumers, analysts have stated that the most significant challenge lies in changing purchasing habits, particularly in major cities where consumers increasingly expect a range of goods, such as groceries and cosmetics, to arrive within 60 minutes. Home delivery of drinks and meals may generate frequent visits to the app, but the real opportunity lies in converting these visits into purchases of higher-margin non-food items…

N.B.: The challenges facing quick commerce in Italy also stem from an unclear situation regarding delivery services.

Drafted on 6 September, updated on 7 September 2026

Quick Take — Uber is set to acquire Delivery Hero in a deal worth $14.8 billion

Uber Technologies Inc. has entered into a ‘business combination’ agreement with Delivery Hero SE, a global local delivery platform, which will enable the company to compete with DoorDash and Just Eat (Prosus) through a mobility and delivery platform covering 99 markets, with customer orders totalling $236 billion ( *) last year, the company said on Thursday.

Uber, which already holds a stake in Delivery Hero, would pay $13.7 billion under the deal, valuing Delivery Hero at $14.8 billion, the company said.

The move doubles the number of markets for Uber’s mobility and delivery services from 34 to 58…

The deal is expected to be finalised by 2027.

(*) on which the company, as with its marketplaces, receives a percentage.

Quick Take — Alibaba reports continued profit compression due to investments in artificial intelligence and instant retail (Quick e-commerce)

Alibaba reported a 3 per cent increase in revenue for the quarter ending 31 March, which fell short of expectations due to a slowdown in the company’s international e-commerce business (Total revenue stood at 243.38 billion yuan for the quarter, or €30.6 billion)

Cloud Intelligence revenues increased by 38%, with artificial intelligence products now accounting for 30% of external cloud revenues. Earlier this year, the company separated its artificial intelligence business from its cloud computing division.

Alibaba said adjusted EBITDA fell 84 per cent due to spending on technology and fast-track commerce, which involves deliveries within 60 minutes. Reuters

There has long been an e-commerce and delivery war going on in China, which, like in the US, has the same customers.