Shinsegae’s logo hangs outside the company’s department store in Seoul, South Korea.
SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
SSouth Korean discount chain E-Mart, a unit of tycoon Chung Yong-jin’s retail group Shinsegae, has agreed to form a joint venture in South Korea with Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba.
“Through the joint venture, combining our domestic distribution knowledge and Alibaba’s e-commerce/IT capabilities, we will expand the sales channels for domestic sellers’ products to be sold and distributed globally on global platforms, and achieve mutual benefits through this, Emart said in a regulatory filing on Thursday that as soon as the news came out, Emart’s share price rose 5.45%, with a market value of 2.1 trillion won (approximately US$1.4 billion).
The new joint venture, called Grand Opus Holding, will be established in 2025 and will be equally owned by Apollo Korea, a subsidiary of Emart, and AliExpress International (Netherlands), a subsidiary of Alibaba.
Emart’s document said, “The company will cooperate with Alibaba to expand Gmarket’s services and improve customer experience.” Gmarket is an online shopping platform owned by New World.
Gmarket CEO Danny Chung joined the company in July from Alibaba, where he served as general manager of South Korea. Last year, Gmarket’s revenue was 1.2 trillion won and a loss of 11 billion won.
The Korean e-commerce market is one of the largest and most competitive in the world. Other players in the highly competitive space include billionaire Bom Kim’s Coupang, PDD Holdings’ Temu and Alibaba’s AliExpress.
Emart acquired Gmarket as part of its $3 billion acquisition of eBay’s Korean business in 2021.
New World Group’s Mr Cheng was promoted from vice chairman to chairman in March. His mother, Lee Myung-hee, is the fifth daughter of Samsung founder Lee Byung-chull, who divided his empire among his children before his death in 1987 , bequeathed New World Group to her.
