Delivery Hero to sell South Korea’s no. 2 food app to get approval for $4b Woowa deal

“Germany’s Delivery Hero will sell South Korean food delivery app Yogiyo as part of conditions for regulatory approval of its US$4 billion takeover of top South Korean food delivery app owner Woowa Brothers,” reported Reuters.

The development comes after South Korea’s antitrust regulator – the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) – on Monday said that it would only approve the deal if the German firm sold all its shares in Korea’s no. 2 food delivery firm Yogiyo in six months. Accepting the decision, Delivery Hero, in a regulatory filing, said it’s expected to complete the deal in the first quarter of 2021.

Last year, the online food delivery firm agreed to buy the food delivery app operator Woowa Brothers.

With about 15.8 million monthly active users as of November, Woowa is South Korea’s no. 1 food delivery app, accounting for 82% of all monthly active users in the segment, said the report, citing IGAWorks.

If the takeover had previously gone through, the combined entity would have held 97% market share as of July, said KFTC.

Another local player in the food delivery space in the country is Coupang Eats, which is owned by SoftBank-backed ecommerce firm Coupang. The startup was ranked third in monthly active users following Woowa’s app and Yogiyo as of November.

Last month, Woowa Brothers-backed food delivery service Baemin said that it will shut down its Vietnammm food app by the end of January 2021.