China delivery player Gogox files for Hong Kong IPO
Gogox, a last-mile logistics company formed through the merger of Hong Kong's GoGoVan and an affiliate of mainland China-based 58.com, has filed to list in Hong Kong
The company has received several rounds of private funding, before and after the merger.
Investors include Alibaba Group and its logistics affiliate Cainiao, Alibaba-backed Hong Kong Entrepreneurs Fund, InnoVision Capital, Qianhai FoF, Russia-China Investment Fund, UBS, Trout & Partners, Greater Bay Area Homeland Investments, Agricultural Bank of China, Orion Investment Group, China Bank of Communications and Cyberport Macro Fund. The latter two groups led a USD 100m round last July.
58.com, the parent of 58 Suyun, which merged with GoGoVan in 2017, is the largest shareholder with 50.5%. GoGoVan and Alibaba hold 17.5% and 15.7%, respectively, according to a prospectus. InnoVision is the next largest with 2.36%.
GoGoVan was founded in 2013 by Steven Lam after a previous start-up idea faltered due to difficulties arranging transportation. Seeing an opportunity in the logistics dysfunction, Lam and his team hit on the idea of an app that could connect van drivers directly to business customers without relying on a call centre.
The 2017 merger valued GoGoVan at more than USD 1bn. It was followed by a rebranding from 58 Suyun to Kuaigou Dache in mainland China in 2018, and from GoGoVan to Gogox in other countries and regions in Asia in 2020.
Gogox now operates in more than 340 cities across mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, and India. It is the third-largest online intra-city logistics platform in mainland China with a market share of 3.2% in terms of gross transaction value (GTV), according to Frost & Sullivan. It is the market leader in Hong Kong with 50.9%.
As of December 2021, Gogox had 27.6m registered shippers and 5.2m registered drivers. However, shipment orders have not tracked a consistent upward curve, largely due to fierce competition. Orders reached 33.4m in 2019 with GTV hitting CNY 3.3bn (USD 497m). The corresponding numbers for 2020 are 27.1m and CNY 2.69bn, and then 28.4m and CNY 2.67bn in 2021.
Over the same three-year period, revenue came to CNY 548.5m, CNY 530.4m and CNY 660.9m, while gross profit margins were 31.6%, 34.6%, to 36.6%. Net losses grew from CNY 183.8m to CNY 658.2m to CNY 872.9m.
Gogox offers three kinds of service: on-demand intra-city logistics by matching drivers with shippers, planned and on-demand services where fees are negotiated directly with the customer, and value-added services such as fuel vouchers and vehicle maintenance and repair. Planned and on-demand services account for more than half of GTV.
The company's major Hong Kong-founded rival is Lalamove, which closed a USD 515m Series E round in 2020.
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