Rocket Internet Bulks Up Price Comparison Portfolio

Rocket Internet’s price-comparison search engine PricePanda, which has been steadily expanding across Asian markets, is merging with Australia’s GetPrice, the two companies announced on Thursday (March 5).

Under the deal, GetPrice co-founder Jared Oken will become CEO of the new merged venture called Next Commerce, while Chris Hitchen, another GetPrice co-founder, will be chairman of the Next Commerce board, which will also include Rocket’s Oliver Samwer. The merged company will continue to operate in Australia and Israel under the GetPrice brand, and under the PricePanda brand in India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, as well as in Mexico, Argentina and Colombia.

The Samwer brothers’ Rocket Internet launched PricePanda in 2012 and the company has been rapidly — and successfully — expanding across emerging markets, though it ran up against competition it couldn’t overcome in Australia. GetPrice launched in 2005 and was acquired by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp Australia, but was spun back out again in late 2012. Over the past decade it has developed a sophisticated technology platform that lists more than 2.5 million products from over 1,300 retailers in Australia.

“This merger with PricePanda lifts the growth potential of both our businesses to a completely new level,” new CEO Oken said in a prepared statement. “Together we will focus on both extending our lead in the Australian market as well as rapid growth in Southeast Asia and other emerging markets, including significant investment in scaling our operations team in Manila and our regional sales team.”

Terms of the deal weren’t announced, but as part of the deal, PricePanda’s existing shareholders — who put in $3 million in a January 2014 funding round — have invested an undisclosed additional amount in the new business. Those investors include Tengelmann Ventures, Investment AB Kinnevik, and Asia Pacific Internet Group, Rocket Internet’s joint venture with Qatar-based telecom company Ooredoo.

The PricePanda-Getprice merger comes just weeks after Rocket paid $570 million for a 30 percent stake in German food-delivery aggregator Delivery Hero. That, in turn, came barely a week after Rocket’s own food delivery portal Hellofood acquired six rival food delivery sites in seven different countries.