Alistair Venn is joining Menulog as the managing director, after heading up Groupon Australia and New Zealand for the last four and a half years. Under his leadership; Groupon ANZ grew to dominate its e-commerce segment facilitating interactions between more than five million members and over 5,000 local businesses every day.

Venn’s career has spanned five continents while working as an engineer and leader for global giants such as Siemens and Rolls Royce Aerospace before leading Groupon.

Following the recent acquisition of the Menulog Group by UK’s Just Eat, the company has undergone a multi-million dollar brand relaunch focussing on growing its network of restaurant partners, expanding the consumer offering and developing both partner and consumer platforms.

Venn’s role will be to further accelerate the growth of the platform, which now already serves more than a million orders a month to more than one million hungry Aussies. He will provide an even greater focus on restaurant and customer engagement and satisfaction while building out the people, processes and technology required to support a platform of such size and growth.

In the last 12 months, more than 1500 restaurants have joined Menulog – boosting the number of its restaurant partners to 7500. The growth in restaurants has strengthened the variety of meal choices for consumers, with over 130 cuisines on offer.

Menulog has also strengthened its internal team, with a further 29 appointments this year, including Venn.

Commenting on his new role, Venn said, “It’s a really exciting time to be joining Menulog, amidst Australia’s online food delivery boom.

“The industry has seen a new wave of growth, and my role will be to ensure Menulog continues to lead the charge in Australia’s food delivery space. I’m looking forward to using my extensive operations and technology experience to take Menulog to further heights.”

Venn will report to Brian Hickey, director of advanced markets at Just Eat plc, Menulog’s parent company.

Hickey said, “We’re very pleased to welcome Alistair to the Just Eat team.

“With strong experience in the local e-commerce market in an equally competitive industry, Alistair will bring strong local insights into Menulog, and will become an invaluable asset as we enter a stage of growth focused on investing in our platform and leading the market.”