Lazada Group

The largest online store in Southeast Asia of Lazada is a part of Lazada Group. The company has offices in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, to Vietnam and on Philippines.

Created in March, 2012, the Lazada company gives to buyers opportunities for shopping using several payment methods, including cash payment on delivery. Lazada offers the wide range of goods in all categories, beginning from consumer electronics and finishing with goods for the house, toys, fashionable clothes and sports equipment.

To trademarks and suppliers Lazada provides the online platform and a partner ecosystem, providing direct access to the audience numbering about 560 million clients in six countries of the world.

2017: Alibaba invests in Lazada

Chinese Alibaba she intends to invest $1 billion in the German-Singapore company Lazada which, as well as itself Alibaba, is engaged in e-commerce. Thus Alibaba will increase the share in Lazada from 51% to 83%. The controlling stake of Lazada was redeemed by Alibaba in April, 2016 also for $1 billion, it was the largest foreign acquisition of the Chinese company. Since then capitalization of Lazada managed to grow, at the moment it is estimated by the buyer approximately at $3.15 billion.

Additional investments will allow Alibaba to strengthen the presence in Southeast Asia where Lazada achieved great popularity. Residents of Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and Philippines use services of its marketplace. According to Alibaba, now in this region only 3% of a total quantity of sales therefore the segment has a high potential for growth are the share of e-commerce. The market of Southeast Asia is mastered by Alibaba rather poorly, the CEO Daniel Zhang notes. Apparently, purchase of Lazada is caused by need to defend the region in fight against such competitors as JD.com and Amazon.com, Bloomberg^[1] writes in June, 2017^[2].

Under the terms of the last transaction of Alibaba paid $500 million for new actions and for $500 million redeemed shares from the current owners. This time it is only about share purchase at owners. In particular, the other day the German Internet company Rocket Internet reported that Alibaba is going to sell 8.8% of shares of Lazada belonging to it. The cost of the transaction will be $276 million. In April, 2016 Rocket Internet already sold Alibaba 9.1% of shares of Lazada for $137 million.

The Swedish investment company Kinnevik which also already sold to Alibaba a half of the stocks of Lazada which are available for it will act as one more seller. The company agrees to give the remained 3.6% for $115 million. The British supermarket chain Tesco has a share block of Lazada also. In April, 2016 the company sold Alibaba 8.6% of shares of Lazada for $129 million.

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