Wix.com Ltd., a leading global web development platform, announced its acquisition of OpenRest, a provider of online ordering and mobile solutions for restaurants.
The move supports Wix's plans to continue to narrow in on the online needs of industry-specific verticals, while expanding the overall depth of its product suite.
With more than 55 million users worldwide, Wix lets anyone create a complete online presence, as well as manage additional aspects of their business beyond website creation, all from one cohesive environment.
OpenRest offers restaurant owners an easy-to-implement, turn-key system enabling online menu and order management, native mobile app development, and payment processing. The OpenRest acquisition is a natural continuation of Wix’s verticalization strategy, first revealed in the company’s August launch of WixHotels. With OpenRest onboard, Wix will now offer restaurant owners a complete online business solution precisely tailored to their needs.
With an estimated 350,000 independent restaurants in the U.S. alone, and the consumer trend of ordering take-out and delivery online and on mobile devices, there is a significant need for restaurants to provide customers with a complete online experience.
OpenRest’s integration into the Wix platform will enable restaurant owners to take orders directly from their Wix websites and native mobile apps, giving them complete ownership of their customers and reducing reliance on costly phone orders or the use of commission-based marketplaces. Wix and OpenRest plan to launch a complete online business management solution for restaurants during 2015.
"OpenRest perfectly complements our strategy to further enhance the Wix platform with tailored industry-specific solutions," says Avishai Avrahami, Wix co-founder and CEO. "With Wix and OpenRest, restaurateurs will have a technologically advanced and cost effective solution to better manage their business and their customers’ experience.”
“We launched OpenRest four years ago with the goal of helping restaurant owners and operators streamline their businesses and tap into the opportunities presented by the internet," say Danny Leshem and Yoav Amit, co-founders of OpenRest who will both join Wix.
"By joining a market leader like Wix, we will be able to exceed this goal and take our technology so much further. We’re very proud of the solution we developed and are excited to continue to change the way restaurants do business online.”
