(Bloomberg) — Grab Holdings Ltd. is moving forward with its attempt to take over GoTo Group, according to people familiar with the matter, who said the Singaporean ride and delivery firm has begun due diligence on its Indonesian rival.
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Grab has been evaluating GoTo’s accounts, contracts and operations, the people said, asking not to be identified because the companies haven’t announced a deal. Grab, GoTo and their shareholders have also been assessing the potential structure and value of an agreement, the people said.
Talks are ongoing and may not lead to a transaction, the people said.
Grab, which is backed by Uber Technologies Inc., has held on-and-off talks with GoTo, but a merger never materialized, partly because of antitrust concerns likely to arise from combining two dominant Southeast Asian tech companies. Uber left the region in 2018 in exchange for its stake in Grab, and smaller competitors haven’t eaten significantly into Grab and GoTo’s market share.
Representatives for Grab and GoTo declined to comment.
Grab is considering a valuation of more than $7 billion for GoTo, Bloomberg News reported in February, with one scenario being an all-stock purchase at over 100 rupiah a share. Discussions have intensified and the two see 2025 as an opportune year for a deal, people with knowledge of the talks have said.
Shares of GoTo, whose investors include SoftBank Group Corp., were trading at 76 rupiah in Jakarta early Tuesday afternoon. They’re up more than 8% this year, giving the company a market value of about 90 trillion rupiah ($5.5 billion).
What Bloomberg Intelligence Says
The chances of regulators clearing a merger between Grab and GoTo, or a takeover of GoTo by Grab, are slim given the combined entity would effectively have a 60-70% share of the Southeast Asian on-demand services market, we calculate using Momentum Works’ data. This may be viewed by the regulator as potential monopolistic behavior. The integration of both operations may not only attract tough regulatory scrutiny, but could also result in workforce retrenchment.
-Nathan Naidu, analyst
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Growth for both Grab and GoTo has cooled dramatically from triple-digit rates as consumers in Southeast Asia curtail spending to cope with elevated inflation and interest rates.
