Instacart co-founder Max Mullen steps back from day to day role at American grocery technology specialist

Instacart co-founder, Max Mullen, has taken to social media to announce a major move.

In a LinkedIn post, Mullen said: “After 13 years, I’m stepping back from my day to day role at Instacart. In 2012, Brandon Leonardo, Apoorva Mehta (who stepped down as CEO in August 2021, relinquishing his board position as Executive Chairman as part of IPO proceedings to Fidji Simo) and I shared a vision for the future. We hand delivered the first orders ourselves, trying to make grocery shopping effortless for our customers.”

“Almost everyone thought the idea was crazy. They said grocery delivery had been tried before and that we’d also fail - or that we’d be squashed by the biggest e-commerce companies in the world. But we knew they were wrong. We saw a future others didn't and had the courage to try to build it.”

He added: “We had no idea how hard it would be, and what followed was the most intense chapter of my professional life. Our biggest competitor bought our biggest customer. We managed through a pandemic that compressed years of growth into months. We took the company public. And through it all, we built a world class team with a unique company culture, staying true to our values.”

Mullen observed that the company now helps millions of households get their groceries delivered each week.

“With the strength of our business, a clear vision, and a world class leadership team in place, I’m moving into an advisory role at Instacart with complete confidence in the company’s future. To all of our partners, shoppers and customers: thank you for putting your trust in us. To the Instacart team, past and present: thank you for rolling up your sleeves alongside me to build an epic company!”

He concluded: “Building Instacart has been the privilege of a lifetime and I'm incredibly energised to use my experience to help the next generation of founders - people with the courage to work on the hardest problems - as an early stage investor.”

Instacart did not respond to our request to comment regarding who will take on Mullen’s day to day responsibilities and what the co-founder’s involvement will be moving forward.

Instaleap

Earlier this week, Instacart announced its acquisition of Instaleap, a global enablement and fulfillment solutions services platform for online retailers. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Instaleap has established relationships with nearly 100 grocery retailers and marketplaces outside North America, including Cencosud, Continente, Jerónimo Martins, Lulu and SPAR. With operations in approximately 30 countries, it has a presence in Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East.

“We see a meaningful opportunity to expand internationally through an enterprise led strategy that empowers retailers across the globe to meet the evolving omnichannel needs of their customers,” said Ryan Hamburger, Chief Commercial Officer at Instacart.

“We’ve already seen growing global demand for our online and in-store technologies, including Storefront Pro and Caper Carts, with early traction in Europe and Australia. With the addition of Instaleap’s technology, international expertise, and deep retail relationships, we can accelerate our international expansion and better serve retailers and consumers around the world.” 

“This is an exciting moment for Instaleap and for the retailers we serve,” said Antonio dos Santos Nunes, CEO and Co-founder at Instaleap. “We’ve built our platform with a deep focus on the unique needs of grocery retailers across diverse international markets. Joining Instacart enables us to scale our impact with the support of a trusted partner that shares our commitment to retailer success.”

Instaleap will initially operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Instacart. The latter says it will offer Instaleap’s retail partners its existing product line, and over time, expects to expand more of its enterprise technology offerings to them, including Storefront Pro, Carrot Ads, Caper Carts, and FoodStorm.