Amid sell-out talks with Amazon, Jabong a step closer to merge into Global Fashion Group

A string of five Rocket Internet-incubated fashion e-com ventures have moved a step closer to integrate into Global Fashion Group (GFG) with the proposed restructuring getting the required approvals from all fiscal and antitrust authorities, as per a disclosure by Sweden's investment firm Kinnevik.

Kinnevik is one of the key investors in the lifestyle e-com ventures which include India's Jabong.

Apart from Jabong, GFG will comprise Dafiti (Latin America), Lamoda (Russia & CIS), Namshi (Middle East) and Zalora (South East Asia & Australia) covering 23 countries.

GFG will operate across five continents with a focus on growth markets, covering 23 countries with a €330 billion fashion market and population of over 2.5 billion people. GFG will market a wide assortment of leading international apparel and accessories brands, a tailored selection of private labels and local assortments developed for specific ethnic markets notably in India, Indonesia and the Middle East.

Kinnevik said it expects completion of the remaining roll-up transactions in Q1 2015.

As part of the deal, all the direct and indirect shareholders in the five existing e-commerce companies will contribute their shares into a newly formed Luxembourg-based entity. The three largest shareholders in GFG will be Kinnevik, Rocket Internet and Access Industries, with 25.1 per cent, 23.5 per cent and 7.4 per cent ownership interests, respectively.

The GFG companies will continue to be led by their respective founders and management teams with a few select additions to the leadership team.

Interestingly, the development comes parallel to talks where Amazon is in discussions to buy Jabong. With a deal size pegged to be in the $1.1-1.2 billion bracket, as first reported by Techcircle.in, it could be the biggest acquisition in the history of the Indian e-commerce space.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)