Southeast Asian ride-hailing and food delivery company Grab is in advanced talks to merge with its smaller Indonesian rival GoTo as the firms seek to stem years of losses, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
A new round of merger talks, which were last held in 2024, resumed in December, with investors eager to reach a deal in 2025. An agreement may not happen, said the sources, with negotiations in previous years all falling through. The people declined to be identified as the talks are private.
Grab and GoTo, which operates ride-hailing and food delivery platform Gojek, declined to comment. The revived talks were first reported by DealStreetAsia.
GoTo shares, listed in Jakarta, ended 7.4% higher on reports of the talks, while Grab was last up 8.8% in premarket trading. Combined, the companies are worth nearly $25 billion.
GoTo, however, said in a filing on Tuesday that it was not engaged in discussions about a potential merger transaction with any party, noting media reports involving Grab Holdings.
Separately, it also said “the company does not have any material corporate action plans for the next 12 months other than the implementation of share buybacks.”
GoTo’s Indonesian e-commerce unit, Tokopedia, was taken over by Tiktok in December 2023, in a deal where the Chinese social media giant would invest $1.5 billion in the unit in exchange for a 75% controlling stake.
Source: Reuters.com