5 exciting UAE foodtech startups to keep an eye on 

While 2020 was a trying year for most businesses, certain sectors found solid success thanks to the unprecedented factors brought upon by the COVID-19 pandemic. Primary among these was the food and beverage (F&B) industry, which saw especially high demand within the food and grocery delivery segment.

Today, we are looking at 5 exciting UAE startups that are carving a name for themselves in the F&B industry. 

1. Kitopi

More of a scaleup than a startup at this point, especially given its $415 million Series C round last summer, the newly-minted unicorn has become the face of the cloud kitchen industry in the UAE. 

Starting life in 2018. Kitopi, which stands for Kitchen Utopia, has since scaled to 200+ brands in 60+ sites over 3+ years. It partners with restaurants and F&B brands, enabling them to expand their reach through its kitchens, in as little as 14 days.

Over the years, a large part of the company’s competitive advantage has been its proprietary Smart Kitchen Operating System (SKOS). SKOS is a suite of applications that optimizes the performance of its cloud kitchen operations in real-time. The solution focuses on delivering a great customer experience across multiple brands in a single kitchen by maximizing operational efficiency. 

Most recently, Kitopi has invested in five major F&B groups, and in the next 22 months, it plans to invest up to $1 billion in the best food brands that have synergy with its operating platform.

2. Sweetheart Kitchen

Another cloud kitchen startup, UAE-based Sweetheart Kitchen is also looking to compete in the regional market. Given that the global cloud kitchen market is expected to grow to $71 billion by 2027, we were bound to see more startups pop up in this sphere to try and grab a bite of the market before it becomes overly saturated. 

Backed by German delivery giant Delivery Hero, Sweetheart Kitchen raised $17.7 million in Series C funding during 2020, and so far has over 15 units across the Middle East. There are plans to expand the brand throughout the region, as well some parts of Asia and possibly even Latin America in the future.

3. ChatFood

An increase in food delivery orders means a greater reliance on food aggregators, which in turn leads to the usual friction between them and restaurants decrying high commission fees. 

Stepping in to alleviate this problem is ChatFood, a startup that is putting online ordering back in the hands of restaurants. It does this by transforming social media channels and a brand’s website into veritable points of sale, where customers can browse menus, order food, track orders, and make inquiries. Most importantly, it does this by providing restaurants with an intuitive ordering system while ensuring they pay zero commission fees. 

With less financial pressure on restaurants, they are in turn able to provide better deals and loyalty rewards to customers, so the value from a solution like ChatFood trickles down to all stakeholders involved.

4. HeyChef

While the UAE is no stranger to unique and interesting F&B concepts, giving customers the ability to book their own chef to cook meals for them is certainly a novelty.

Launched in 2020, HeyChef is the first company to offer an on-demand personal chef service in the region.

HeyChef’s services are offered on daily, weekly, and monthly bases, ideal for parties , gatherings and corporate events. Each chef has expertise in a certain type of cuisine, but also has the ability to adapt as per their customer’s preferred tastes. In addition, they are able to cook popular foods that are requested by customers. 

The startup has been operating for over a year now, serving more than 500 customers in Dubai, and has completed more than 3,000 bookings. 

5. Deliverect

Another startup that is solving aggregator-related challenges, Deliverect is offering F&B brands a POS-based solution that consolidates orders from different aggregators on one platform, eliminating the need for manually inputting orders and reducing the resulting errors.

Deliverect believes that some of the biggest operational issues of food delivery and online ordering can be easily dealt with by optimizing delivery management and integrating online sales channels with a restaurant's POS (point-of-sale) system, and hence why the company created this solution.