Dubai-based cloud kitchen startup Kaykroo raises $4m in new funding

A new cloud kitchen startup, Kaykroo, has raised $4m in pre-Series A funding round led by local family offices and regional investors.

Kaykroo will use the funds to further develop its proprietary technology as well as drive an ambitious GCC expansion plan.

Over the last decade, the team behind Kaykroo has operated six independent brick and mortar restaurants, including Man’oushe Street, The Good Bowl, Hummus Brothers among others. Now, these conventional restaurants will be relaunched as delivery and takeaway-centric cloud kitchens.

Kaykroo says it will introduce four new brands to the market with a further 10 concepts on the pipeline over the next six months.

“The high demand we have witnessed since the start of the year, with more than one million orders fulfilled by our existing brands, proves that it is now more important than ever for our customers to be able to enjoy the food they love, anywhere and at any time,” said Jihad El-Eit, founder & CEO of kaykroo.

“We are moving from traditional ‘brick and mortar’ to an innovative ‘brick and click’ platform that makes the ordering process much easier and quicker while allowing us to gather insights and create new experiences that satisfy different tastes at various price points,” he added.

Read: Dubai-based Sweetheart Kitchen raises €15m in new funding

Online food delivery, like most other e-commerce ventures, has exploded in popularity amid the Covid-19 outbreak. Dubai-based cloud kitchen brand Kitopi announced in February that it had secured funding worth $60 million to expand operations. In August, another Dubai-based cloud kitchen platform iKcon announced it has secured $10m of funding since inception. Then earlier this month, Sweetheart Kitchen raised $17.7m in new funding

According to a new report published by Allied Market Research, the global cloud kitchen market size was valued at $43.1bn in 2019 and is estimated to reach $71.4bn by 2027 with a CAGR of 12.0 per cent from 2021 to 2027.