이 기사는 2021년 06월 16일 08:05 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

Kakao Commerce is set to be merged back into its parent company, Kakao Corp, a move seen as part of efforts by the South Korean tech giant to survive the intensifying competition in the ecommerce market.

Kakao Corp has scheduled a board meeting next Tuesday to approve a merger with Kakao Commerce, in which the company holds a 99.62% stake, industry sources said.

The rare decision of the rollback comes less than three years after Kakao’s shopping division was split off to form Kakao Commerce in December 2018. The move is widely viewed as the tech giant’s strategy to get a bigger slice in the fast-growing ecommerce market.

The merger will likely enable Kakao Corp to boost its war chest. Kakao Commerce held roughly 400 billion won ($358 million) in cash and cash equivalents at the end of 2020, and generated strong operating cash flows of 275.5 billion won last year. It also remains financially sound with a debt ratio of 238%.

Kakao Corp is expected to use the money secured by the merger for acquisitions as it is stepping up efforts to take on Coupang and Naver, which currently dominate the domestic ecommerce market.

Competition in the market is getting fiercer as market players are spending more money to expand their presence. Ebay Korea, which was up for sale earlier this year, attracted strong interest from strategic investors despite its high price tag of 5 trillion won, with retail giants Lotte and Shinsegae currently remaining in the race.

Kakao Corp, which initially expressed interest in acquiring eBay Korea, unexpectedly withdrew from the bidding process after deciding that eBay Korea’s open market platforms are not a good fit with its ecommerce business focused on mobile apps and customized shopping experiences.

Instead, Kakao Corp acquired Zigzag in April for about 1 trillion won. They are similar in terms of the business direction. The online fashion platform, which targets female customers in their 20s and 30s, offers services that recommend products based on preferences of users.


Kakao Commerce has grown rapidly for the past two years, with over 10 million monthly buyers and 21.7 million monthly active users at the end of December 2020. Its revenue nearly doubled to 573.5 billion won year-on-year in 2020, with operating profit and net profit growing more than two-fold to 160 billion won and 123 billion won, respectively, in the same period. (Reporting by Hana Suh)