It’s been a big year for Louisiana-based Waitr, a food delivery startup from Lake Charles.
In May, Waitr was acquired by Texas billionaire Tilman Fertitta, owner of the Houston Rockets and president of Landry’s restaurants. He runs Landcadia Holdings, a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company, which combined with Waitr. Lancadia Holdings then changed its name to Waitr Holdings, Inc.
The startup kept rapidly expanding to new cities and increasing its footprint across the country, and then went public on November 16.
“Our combined expertise, experience and resources, and being a publicly-traded company will further enable us to accelerate our growth in the markets we currently serve, expand into new markets and take advantage of potential opportunistic acquisitions,” said Chris Meaux, founder and CEO of Waitr.
Most recently, the company acquired Bite Squad for a total amount of roughly $321.3 million, combination of cash and shares of Waitr common stock. Waitr and Bite Squad have a similar business model where they partner with restaurants and connect drivers to diners.
With the existing Bite Squad markets, Waitr is now in 86 markets, more than 500 cities, and across 22 states.