Delivery Hero had a plan: co-founder Niklas Östberg would step down as chief executive in March 2027. That plan lasted until Uber showed up with an offer.
On Sept. 24, the German food-delivery group said Östberg would remain in the job beyond the previously announced date of March 31, 2027. The reason, the company made clear, is Uber Technologies’ $14.8 billion takeover bid.
In May, Delivery Hero had announced that Östberg would step down next March as part of a leadership transition. The reversal this week puts him back at the helm for the most consequential stretch in the company’s history: steering a sale to its largest global rival while unwinding the pieces that regulators will not let Uber keep.
Uber’s offer values Delivery Hero at about $14.8 billion, or 41.50 euros a share in cash. Adjusted for Uber’s earlier purchases of Delivery Hero stock, the value is closer to $13.7 billion. The two companies have already agreed on the deal, which now awaits regulatory approval.
Östberg will lead the company through the sale process while also advancing parallel asset disposals, according to the Financial Times. As part of the transaction, Delivery Hero is expected to divest its businesses in 14 markets where Uber Eats and Delivery Hero overlap, for about $1.6 billion.
The co-founder’s continued presence is more than symbolic. Östberg helped build Delivery Hero from a Berlin startup founded in 2011 into a delivery group spanning dozens of countries, listed on the Frankfurt exchange since 2017. His contract runs until April 30, 2029. Earlier this month, the company said it was in favor of the takeover bid, a signal that the board wanted a steady hand through the regulatory review.
The deal itself is the largest Uber has attempted, and it redraws the map of food delivery in Europe and Asia. Delivery Hero operates in markets where Uber Eats has been unable to gain ground on its own, and the acquisition would give Uber a ready-made network of restaurants, riders and customers across the region. Uber has lined up a committed bridge facility of roughly 14 billion euros to fund the offer.
For Uber chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi, the transaction would cap a years-long effort to consolidate food delivery after a period of retrenchment, when the company sold or scaled back in markets it could not win. Delivery Hero, with its deep roots in Europe and the Middle East, is the kind of asset Uber once avoided and now needs if it is to keep growing its delivery business.
The divestments point to the deal’s one serious obstacle. In countries where the two companies are the dominant players, competition regulators are expected to demand sales before they will clear the transaction. The 14-market disposal is the price the companies have already agreed to pay, and more conditions could follow once Brussels and other watchdogs weigh in.
Keeping the founder in the chair is also a bet on continuity. A sale of this size, with parallel divestments and regulators in multiple jurisdictions, is a long process, and analysts said a change of leadership mid-deal would add risk that neither side wants. Östberg’s reversal spares the company that question.
Delivery Hero’s reach spans more than 70 countries, built through years of acquisitions of regional brands such as Glovo, foodpanda and Woowa Brothers, the operator of South Korea’s Baemin. That footprint is part of what makes the company attractive to Uber, and part of what makes the antitrust review so complicated.
The transaction fits a wider consolidation wave in delivery, where the economics of running fleets of riders have pushed smaller players toward larger ones for years. Uber’s move on Delivery Hero is the clearest sign yet that the biggest operators now see scale itself as the way to make delivery profitable.
The two companies know each other well. Uber bought Delivery Hero’s foodpanda business in Taiwan in 2024 for $950 million, a smaller transaction that gave both sides a template for how an overlap sale can be structured. The current offer is that playbook scaled up across a continent.
The timing of the original exit plan, announced in May, had been the subject of speculation ever since Uber’s approach became public. By scrapping it, Delivery Hero has removed one uncertainty from a transaction that still carries plenty of others.
For now, the chief executive who was supposed to be leaving is staying, and the reason is sitting in the deal terms: someone has to carry a $14.8 billion sale across the finish line, and the founder is the one the board chose. Delivery Hero shares, like those of other delivery operators, have swung with sentiment about the sector’s path to profitability, and the offer removes that uncertainty for shareholders once and for all.
