As per the latest Bloomberg reports claim that Alibaba Group is making an investment of USD 3 billion in Southeast Asia’s biggest ride-hailing firm Grab Holdings Inc. This Chinese firm will be the prime and sole investor in the funding round. Additionally, they will spend a portion of their funds to acquire some of the Grab stock undertaken by Uber Technologies Inc, Bloomberg added. However, Grab declined to mark any words over this trending news. Alibaba and Uber were not available for any immediate responses or comments.
In March 2018, Uber surrendered its Southeast Asian operations to Grab. Ultimately, it became a 27.5 percent stakeholder in Grab’s business. Furthermore, in April, Uber imposed an impairment charge of up to $2.2 billion against the carrying value of some of the company’s minority equity assets. Statistically, Grab holds an estimated valuation of $14 billion. This value covers SoftBank Group Corp as one of its backers assisting in financial services, food delivery, and mobile payments. Followed by June, Grab declared a 5 percent reduction in staff numbers amid the Covide 19 situation. Hence impacting the costs and growth of the company.
What Happens if Alibaba Pours an Investment in Grab?
Alibaba has been investing to buy some of the Grab stock owned by San Francisco-based Uber Technologies, as reported by Bloomberg. This deal might represent one of the biggest deals on Southeast Asia since its first investment in Lazada in 2016,” Bloomberg said. If you look, Alibaba, China’s largest eCommerce platform has not yet ventured into ride-hailing. But, Bloomberg outlined that such a deal would allow Alibaba to access the data of millions of users belonging to different eight countries along with Grab’s various holdings. Additionally, an investment by Alibaba could deliberately boost the growth of Lazada in the competitive market share with Tencent-backed Shopee.
In the final analysis…
The Covid-19 pandemic has brought so much evolution into business processes while adversely impacting the people’s movements. Consequently, the shares for both Grab and Gojek have been selling at major discounts, as reported by Financial Times. In such a scenario, a mutual agreement can potentially help in accelerating both Grab and Gojek’s paths to financial gains. However, Indonesia – being the biggest market for the two startups – remains a vital part of a potential deal. Whereas both Grab and Gojek are wanting a bigger slice of the country’s ride-hailing market.
