6 big points from Uber v. DoorDash

Uber says DoorDash is intentionally blocking its efforts to grow its white-label delivery business.

photo via Unsplash

On Friday, Uber sued DoorDash in California Superior Court alleging anticompetitive practices. The suit claims that DoorDash, the undisputed delivery leader in America (Uber concedes this fact in the first sentence of the suit) used its position to prevent restaurants from using Uber’s white-label delivery platform, Uber Direct.

Uber Direct, launched in 2020, competes… directly with DoorDash Drive On-Demand, which was introduced in late 2016, nearly four years earlier. Last fall, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi promised his company would continue to “invest aggressively” in Direct delivery as a service, vowing to hire more engineers to bolster the product and attract more customers. It was clear that he believed this type of white-label, direct delivery was a huge part of Uber’s future. (This newsletter agreed.)

Also last fall, Uber Direct scored a huge win when it landed an exclusive delivery deal with Olive Garden, a rare delivery-avoidant national chain. What was less visible at the time was that Uber was also keeping a tally of the big restaurant delivery deals it didn’t get. In its recent filing, Uber cites 17 specific but unnamed examples of restaurants — large groups, mostly — it says were strong-armed out of signing Uber Direct deals, either as an exclusive provider or second option to DoorDash Drive On-Demand.

In a statement provided to multiple media outlets, DoorDash said that Uber’s case has no merit. Further, according to the statement, “Their claims are unfounded and based on their inability to offer merchants, consumers, or couriers a quality alternative.”

Uber’s lawsuit spells out exactly how and why it believes DoorDash is acting illegally to stymie its white-label delivery business. Here are six lines (with context) from Uber’s filling that sum up its argument: