Souq.com has been looking to sell a stake in the e-commerce platform for the past year, having appointed Goldman Sachs last year to ferry out investors. Since that announcement, two key companies have emerged as leading contenders for the stake in Souq: Amazon and India’s Flipkart Online.
While Souq was initially looking to sell a 30% stake in the company, Amazon was in talks for a total acquisition, which was reported by Bloomberg to be in the region of $1 billion. Now according to a new report from Bloomberg, both Amazon and FlipKart Online have walked away from discussions over a stake or acquisition of the e-commerce platform.
Souq.com is now apparently in talks with the Dubai-based conglomerate Al-Futtaim as well as other undisclosed potential investors. According to Souq’s website, the platform sells more than 400,000 products, across multiple categories, to customers in the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Customers number in the millions on a daily basis according to Souq.com.
Source: Bloomberg
