Founded in 2011, the company operates in 70+ countries internationally in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin and South America, and the Middle East, and partners with 500,000+ restaurants.

In general, and in contrast to recent legal precedents in Canada[8] and Australia, Delivery Hero does not classify these couriers as employees.

This policy has led to ongoing legal battles and labour disputes, and may be linked to the shutdowns of Delivery Hero's operations in several countries.

[10][11] Under the leadership of Niklas Östberg and Fabian Siegel, Delivery Hero first expanded to Australia and the United Kingdom in 2011.

[12] Delivery Hero then raised €25 million in new funding to finance acquisitions in four European countries: Sweden, Finland, Austria and Poland.

[14] In 2012 and 2013, the harsh competition between the various delivery service online portals led the German press to dub the events as cyberwar between the big web-portals.

Delivery Hero was prosecuted for perpetrating DoS attacks against its competitors and stealing data from the other web services.

One month later Delivery Hero bought the Turkish competitor Yemeksepeti for 530 million Euro, which was the largest acquisition in this business sector to date.

[29] The German stock exchange Deutsche Börse announced on 19 August 2020 that Delivery Hero will replace Wirecard in Germany's leading index DAX.

[30][31] In August 2020, Delivery Hero acquired Instashop for 360 million dollars, the largest price ever commanded by a Greek startup.

In August 2012 Delivery Hero received an additional €40 million funded primarily by Kite Ventures and Kreos Capital.

[48] In May 2017, Naspers, a global internet and entertainment group and one of the world's largest technology investors, invested EUR 387 million in Delivery Hero.

Delivery Hero invested $105M and now holds a stake of 20%, becoming the largest shareholder of the company and bringing Niklas Oestberg to its board of directors.

Couriers working for Delivery Hero's brands have mounted campaigns to assert their rights, including several successful legal battles.

However, Delivery Hero's 2018 Annual Report shows that the company does indeed assess country-by-country the costs and risks of government policies including social security, stating: "Country specific and economic requirements, including employment legislation and social security, increase the complexity of the rider management as part of the own delivery services.

"[73] In 2018 Foodora Australia abruptly shut down operations while facing several lawsuits: including one from the country's Fair Work Ombudsman which accused the company of sham contracting,[74] and several court cases relating to unpaid benefits and wrongful dismissal.

The Transport Workers Union subsequently accused Foodora of shutting down to "avoid responsibility for paying its riders millions of dollars in backpay as a result of wage theft.

In April 2020, two months after Ontario Labour Relations Board decision, Foodora Canada announced that it was shutting down, citing oversaturation of the Canadian market.

[80] In 2023, Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) imposed a 630,000 euro administrative fine on Delivery Hero for failing to disclose inside information.