Rocket-backed frontier markets e-commerce platforms to merge

Both brands are part of Rocket's Asia Pacific Internet Group (APACIG), which operates as a joint venture between Rocket and Qatari telecom company Ooredoo, although Daraz has also raised capital independently. In September of last year, UK development finance institution CDC Group committed EUR20 million ($22 million) as part of a EUR50 million round that also included APACIG.

Daraz was incubated by Rocket and started in Pakistan in 2012 as an online fashion business, before becoming a general marketplace offering products such as electronics and home appliances as well as fashion. It has also expanded its geographic footprint to include Bangladesh and Myanmar. Kaymu was also launched in Pakistan in 2012 and has a similar product portfolio targeting smaller businesses.

The two companies will maintain separate websites in Pakistan and Bangladesh while operating under a single brand name - Daraz Group - in all other markets. They will seek to offer more localized services, although shared functions such as IT, marketing and business development will be centralized in Karachi.

"Pioneer markets in Asia have a huge potential and are experiencing the fastest rise of e-commerce and mobile disruption ever measured. With a fast growing population and the tremendous growth rates of mobile and internet penetration it is only a matter of time until these markets will succeed," Hanno Stegmann, CEO of APACIG, said in a statement.

APACIG comprises 16 e-commerce and online marketplace companies operating across 15 countries. Earlier this year, one of the other member companies, emerging markets property portal Lamudi, raised EUR29 million from Rocket Internet and several additional investors.

• Tweet  
• Facebook  
• LinkedIn  
• Google plus  
• Save this article  
• Send to  

• Topics
• South Asia
• Southeast Asia
• Technology
• Consumer
• M&A
• Rocket Internet
• Pakistan
• Myanmar
• Bangladesh
• TMT