Giosis, the Singapore-based parent company of e-commerce platform Qoo10 which is backed by online marketplace eBay, is set to sell Qoo10’s Japanese operations to the corporate for $700m, Bloomberg reported yesterday.
The corporate will give up its stake in Giosis as part of the transaction, a person familiar with the matter told Bloomberg.
Founded in 2010 as a joint venture between eBay and online marketplace Gmarket’s founder Ku Young Bae, Giosis operates six e-commerce marketplaces under the Qoo10 name across Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, Hong Kong and Japan.
Gmarket was bought by eBay for $1.2bn in 2009 and an acquisition of Qoo10 Japan is expected to further boost the firm’s position in Northeast Asia.
Giosis raised $20m in seed funding from eBay and Bae at the time of its formation in 2010, before going on to raise $82.1m in a series A round led by media group Singapore Press Holdings in 2015.
The series A round also featured eBay as well as Oak Investment Partners, Saban Capital Group, UVM 2 Venture Investments and Brookside Capital.