\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nHe added that the deal was “a very independent decision by both companies” and was “highly” supported by their common investor, Japan\u2019s SoftBank Group.<\/p>\n
Grab on Monday also said it will take over the operations of Uber’s food delivery business, Uber Eats. Grab will expand its existing GrabFood businesses in Indonesia and Thailand to two more countries – Singapore and Malaysia – following the integration of the Uber Eats business.<\/p>\n
Grab said that GrabFood will be available across all major South-east Asian countries in the first half of 2018. “To minimise disruption, Grab and Uber are working together to promptly migrate Uber drivers and riders, Uber Eats customers, merchant partners and delivery partners to the Grab platform.”<\/p>\n
The Uber app will continue to operate for two weeks to “ensure stability” for Uber drivers, who can sign up online to drive with Grab. Uber Eats will run until the end of May, after which Uber delivery and restaurant partners will move onto the GrabFood platform.<\/p>\n
Grab chief Anthony Tan said: “Today’s acquisition marks the beginning of a new era. The combined business is the leader in platform and cost efficiency in the region. Together with Uber, we are now in an even better position to fulfil our promise to outserve our customers.”<\/p>\n
The deal marks the third time that Uber has either sold or merged one of its businesses outside the US. Uber sold its China business to rival Didi Chuxing\u00a0and merged its Russia operations\u00a0with tech firm\u00a0Yandex.<\/p>\n
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, in emails to staff posted in\u00a0the Uber Newsroom, argued that\u00a0the company\u00a0was not on a \u00a0consolidation path.<\/p>\n
He wrote: “It is fair to ask whether consolidation is now the strategy of the day, given this is the third deal of its kind, from China to Russia and now Southeast Asia. The answer is no.<\/p>\n
“One of the potential dangers of our global strategy is that we take on too many battles across too many fronts and with too many competitors. This transaction now puts us in a position to compete with real focus and weight in the core markets where we operate, while giving us valuable and growing equity stakes in a number of big and important markets where we don’t.”<\/p>\n
According to a CNBC report on Monday, Mr Khosrowshahi also wrote that around 500 Uber employees in South-east Asia would move over to Grab, while a\u00a0Uber spokesperson said some staff would remain part of Uber’s Asia Pacific operations and\u00a0there would be no\u00a0lay-offs as part of the deal with Grab.<\/p>\n
Grab,\u00a0which started out as a taxi-hailing app in Kuala Lumpur in 2012 and is now headquartered in Singapore, has become the region\u2019s dominant ride-hailing service\u00a0with US$4 billion raised from investors.<\/p>\n
Uber\u00a0lost US$4.5 billion last year and has burned through US$10.7 billion since its founding nine years ago.\u00a0 Analysts say by that by\u00a0exiting the tough South-east Asian,Uber could narrow its losses and better position\u00a0itself for a 2019 initial public offering in the US.<\/p>\n
Expectations of\u00a0 an Uber exit from South-east Asia ratcheted up\u00a0after Japanese financial giant Softbank, which is already a key investor in Grab, became Uber’s biggest shareholder with a 15 per cent stake. SoftBank, which has also taken major stakes in China’s\u00a0Didi and India\u2019s Ola, has been\u00a0pushing for consolidation in the global ride-hailing industry, which has been bleeding\u00a0billions of dollars a year due to turf wars.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Reference:\u00a0http:\/\/www.straitstimes.com\/business\/companies-markets\/grab-buys-ubers-south-east-asia-business-uber-gets-275-stake-in-grab<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Straits Times SINGAPORE – Singapore-based Grab on Monday (March 26)\u00a0confirmed that\u00a0it has acquiredUber’s South-east Asia operations for an undisclosed sum – putting an end to recent\u00a0speculation about the merger between the two ride-hailing giants. Bloomberg had reported on Sunday\u00a0that the two companies had reached\u00a0a deal. Uber will take a 27.5 per cent stake in Grab, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[8],"class_list":["post-358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","category-news","tag-ibmbinus-univbinus-binusuniv-bbsbinus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":359,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358\/revisions\/359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bbs.binus.ac.id\/ibm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}