The Rise and Fall of Take Eat Easy, or Why Markets are not Easy to Take in the Sharing Economy.

We examine the reasons behind the rise and fall of Take Eat Easy, a Belgian home food delivery platform, in order to understand better the competitive dynamics that are at play in the sharing economy. We start by describing the home food delivery market in Europe and by summarizing the key milestones in the short existence of Take Eat Easy. We propose next a brief review of what the economic literature on digital platforms teaches us about what they do and how they compete. On that basis, we analyse more deeply the strategic choices taken by the leadership of Take Eat Easy, and their implications. Finally, we combine the two previous analyses to question the sustainability of the current business model of platforms in the sharing economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]