Just been looking back at how some of the major publicly traded food delivery companies performed and honestly there's some interesting patterns worth talking about. A couple years back when rates were expected to drop, there was real momentum in this space. The thing is, these companies weren't just surviving on razor-thin margins anymore.

What caught my attention is how the winners in this sector weren't necessarily the ones with the biggest user base. It was the ones actually deploying AI effectively. Think about it - these companies sit on mountains of data about consumer behavior, delivery patterns, customer preferences. The ones that figured out how to weaponize that data through AI models? They started pulling away from the pack. Better routing, smarter predictions, less friction in the whole experience.

Let me break down three plays that analysts were pretty bullish on. DoorDash had that monster 2023 run, up over 100%. Some Deutsche Bank analyst had it at $125 or so. The interesting thesis wasn't just about restaurant delivery though - it was about the total addressable market expanding. Groceries, retail goods, all that stuff. Beyond just food. That's where the real upside could come from.

Then there's Uber. Ride-hailing giant that also owns a solid chunk of food delivery. That stock was up even more than DoorDash in 2023, around 148%. Made it into the S&P 500. The data advantage they have across both transportation and delivery? That's actually pretty hard to replicate. Though some analysts were getting cautious heading into 2024, worried about a potential slowdown.

Instacart was the newcomer, went public in September 2023. Took a hit early on but was trading at pretty reasonable multiples - around 2.2x price-to-sales. Their whole thing is grocery delivery where they've got real expertise. JPMorgan was looking at like $33 per share as a target. The competitive moat there seemed interesting because they'd already built out the infrastructure and relationships with grocers.

The overarching theme that made sense was that publicly traded food delivery companies with the best tech infrastructure and data capabilities would be the ones actually expanding margins and market share. Not just surviving on volume. The ones embracing AI properly were going to be the ones that mattered. That's where I'd focus if looking at this sector - which companies actually have the technical depth to leverage their data, versus which ones are just doing the same thing as competitors but cheaper.