Carlyle , the American multinational private equity, alternative asset management and financial services corporation is all set to invest $200 million in Kakao Mobility in a pre-initial public offering.
Kakao Mobility is a technology company found in August 2017 that offers a variety of transportation-related services such as taxi, designated driver, parking and navigation through its mobile applications and it also the largest Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) platform in South Korea.
Kakao T is a Korean transportation service app launched by Kakao Mobility Corp., a subsidiary of Kakao. The service provides taxi-hailing, designated driver booking, nearby parking space searching, and real-time traffic information service.
Both the organisations are expected to sign a final deal by the end of February. Under this deal Carlyle the U.S based private equity firm is expected to secure a 10 percent stake in the technology services firm.
Two other private equity firms are known to have taken part in the bidding for Kakao Mobility’s pre-initial public offering, a U.S. based investment bank UBS had been named prior to Carlyle.
Ryu Gung-seon, The CEO of Kakao Mobility, said:
“Our partnership with Carlyle will enable us to expedite our growth strategy for our smart mobility platform,”
“Which aims to create a more comfortable and convenient mobility experience for users. As a leading mobility player,”
“We will work with various companies in the mobility industry to build an ecosystem through our Kakao T platform by focusing on the customers and improving service quality.”
The Firm Carlyle has more than two decades of experience investing in the technology sector and it has also been investing in South Korea for more than twenty years.
Previous year Carlyle had invested in KB Financial group and formed a alliance with the company to collaborate on new investment opportunities both in Korea and overseas.
Expectations on Kakao Mobility are growing that the company will be able to achieve a major turnaround in 2021 after reporting operating losses.
