Pick.A.Roo targets to widen reach, partner with more brands

MEGAWORLD Corp.’s all-in-one lifestyle delivery application Pick.A.Roo is planning to expand its services to Visayas and Mindanao, and partner with more brands in food and grocery segments.

Eric B. Bataga, chief executive officer of Pick.A.Roo, said that the company is looking to expand its presence and reach key cities down south.

“We have plans to increase the brand and also our presence. Right now, we are present only in Metro Manila and some outskirts of Metro Manila but we plan to move to Visayas and Mindanao,” Mr. Bataga told BusinessWorld in a recent interview.

When asked what specific locations the company is looking at, he said: “We are looking at Cebu, Bacolod, Iloilo, and Davao.”

For brands, Mr. Bataga said that the company is eyeing to have more partners in food and grocery segments.

“There are still a lot of brands in food that we don’t have yet so we are hoping to partner with a lot of quick service restaurants and then for groceries, we are targeting some of the known brands,” he said.

Meanwhile, Mr. Bataga said the company is in the process of raising funds from local and international venture capitalists and investors.

“Right now, we are doing our fundraising. We are on our Series A. We are looking for venture capitalists or investors here and abroad,” he said.

“We started around the fourth quarter of last year. We did our room show last year and are still continuously doing up until this year,” he added.

The company is looking to raise around $20 million from the fundraising activity. It has no concrete plans yet of entering the equity market, Mr. Bataga said.

Pick.A.Roo is an on-demand delivery startup project under Megaworld’s digital investment arm Agile Digital Ventures, Inc.

When Agile Digital Ventures was launched in 2020, it allocated a three-year capital expenditure of $5 million to build Pick.A.Roo for three years. — Justine Irish D. Tabile