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VOOZH | about |
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Food Rocket is a food delivery service that began operating in San Francisco in 2021. The company works the same as Yandex.Shop and Samokat: users order the delivery of products in a mobile application and after 10-15 minutes the courier brings them an order home. In addition, artificial intelligence analyzes user purchases and forms personal recommendations for each consumer. In addition, the product uses demand forecasting technology to optimize food waste.
Among the founders of Food Rocket is Vitaly Alexandrov, founder of CRM marketing agency Out of Cloud, as well as Jerrin James, former operating director of Driven Deliveries, who was also responsible for logistics and supplies in such tech giants as Facebook and Amazon.
On April 26, 2022, Food Rocket, a San Francisco-based company offering food delivery in the Bay Area within 15 minutes, reported raising funding of $25 million.
The Series A funding round was led by Alimentation Couche-Tard using its Circle K Venture Fund. Canadian company ATC owns stores such as Circle K in the USA and Couche-Tard in Quebec. The deal will allow Food Rocket to work closely with Circle K to expand e-commerce and delivery capabilities. ACT owns more than 14 thousand round-the-clock stores Circle K and Couche-Tard in 26 countries and territories, including more than 7 thousand in the USA.
Food Rocket, founded in San Francisco in 2021 by CEO Vitaly Alexandrov, moved its headquarters to Chicago in early 2022. The company provides a platform for product delivery services within 15 minutes without charging shipping fees and minimum order requirements. The company's services are built on the basis of AI forecasting and enterprise resource planning to manage the assortment of products taking into account the specifics of each place and maximizing the use of delivery capabilities, which allows customers to quickly buy everyday goods at almost the same price as in local grocery stores without leaving home.
Food Rocket uses artificial intelligence-enabled technologies to manage inventory, predict demand and optimize delivery times, calculating the nearest store with the fastest delivery time and lowest cost.
| We understand that the business model lies not only in the delivery of products - Alexandrov said in an interview. We're creating new customer habits. From the first day, we had the idea to eventually turn all our stores into micro-centers for fulfilling orders, into which goods will be delivered from local markets. |
| Our artificial intelligence-based algorithms analyze user purchases to increase the retention rate of each customer. We continue to build our team internationally, recruiting people from giant companies such as Gopuff and DoorDash he said. |
Discussing the cooperation plan with Circle K, Alexandrov explained that this partnership allowed the company to grow faster and more efficiently and reach higher profitability faster than others. The company will also be able to use the size and scale of Circle K, consumer understanding, marketing experience, procurement network and supply chain, and Circle K will be able to use the patented Food Rocket software to predict the level of inventory and workload of employees.
| By attracting the experience of our investors in the field of retail trade, we will be able to significantly improve the economy of a unit of goods by reducing the cost of purchasing goods and marketing expenses - said Vitaly Alexandrov. In the food delivery market, this is a unique opportunity to stand out against the background of competitors. |
Alexandrov said that the funds received will be used to expand the service in Chicago (about 15 stores will be opened there) and San Francisco, as well as in other cities, including Boston, Philadelphia and Los Angeles. Food Rocket plans to create more than 2 thousand jobs in new areas and remains one of the few startups offering full employment to all its passengers, he added.[1]
At the end of April 2021, it became known that Food Rocket attracted $2 million in investments from the funds of Baring Vostok, AltaIR Capital, the business angels club AngelsDeck, the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (FRII), the founder of a similar British service Jiffy Arthur Shamalov and the co-founder of the Food Party (now Yandex.Chef Philip).
By the end of April 2021, Food Rocket operates only in San Francisco. However, by the end of the year, the company plans to launch 150 darkstores on the west coast of the United States, each of which will serve up to 25 thousand households.
| We see that the business model that we chose for Food Rocket is gaining momentum around the world. In the USA, the level of competition in this market is still not very high, which gives us the opportunity to become leaders in the field of fast delivery of products and goods for home. Our goal is to replace physical supermarkets and change the current habits of consumers regarding the purchase of products, "said Vitaly Alexandrov, co-founder and head of the startup.[2] |
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