South Korea’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC) has given conditional approval for a joint venture between Shinsegae Group and Alibaba Group to co-control G Market and AliExpress Korea.

Shinsegae, a major South Korean retail group, and China-based Alibaba each hold a 50% stake in the venture, which will make G Market and AliExpress Korea subsidiaries.

The FTC imposed conditions to prevent the two companies from sharing or combining domestic consumer data in the online overseas direct purchase market.

The regulator found that the joint venture would control 41% of the domestic online overseas direct purchase market, with AliExpress holding 37.1% and G Market 3.9%.

The FTC expressed concern that combined data could strengthen the new entity’s market dominance through network effects.

To address this, the companies must operate independently, keep consumer data technically separate, and give users a choice about data sharing in other markets.

These measures will be enforced for three years, and may be extended based on market developments.

🔗 Source: The Chosun Daily

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