Dada went public at $16 a share and left five years later at $2. In 2020 its riders were everywhere. In the year before the IPO, more than 634,000 of them delivered 822 million orders across China. Dada ran two linked businesses. Dada Now was an open delivery network any shop could hire. JD-Daojia let shoppers order from Walmart and local supermarkets on their phones. When it filed in May 2020, lockdowns had taught millions of people to buy groceries online.

A Rider Network, Then a Store

Philip Kuai started Dada Now around 2014 as an on-demand delivery platform for merchants and individual senders. In 2016 it bought JD-Daojia, the local retail arm of e-commerce giant JD.com. The deal made JD a major shareholder, and Walmart invested too. The bet was that riders and storefronts work better together. Supermarkets got an online channel without building one, and Dada's riders had steady orders to carry between them.

Sixteen Dollars Down to Two

Dada priced its IPO at $16 per American depositary share on June 5, 2020, and listed on Nasdaq as DADA. Goldman Sachs, BofA Securities, and Jefferies ran the deal. Growth slowed and the stock slid for years. JD.com raised its stake to a majority and in April 2025 agreed to buy the rest. The deal closed on June 16, 2025, at $2 per share, and Dada left Nasdaq.

Cover: The Small Courier, Albrecht Dürer. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a courier on horseback (the delivery rider).