Polish e-commerce group Allegro has agreed to buy Czech online retailer Mall Group for 881 million euros ($1.02 billion) to create a regional platform, sending its shares up as much as 11%.
Allegro announced late on Thursday that it would acquire the e-commerce assets of Mall Group and the logistics assets of WE|DO from Jakub Havrlant’s Rockaway Capital investment group, PPF Group and Daniel Kretinsky and Patrik Tkac’s EC Investments.
Allegro’s shares, which have fallen more than 40% this year amid competition jitters in its home market, were up 11% at 1234 GMT.
The deal comes amid intensifying competition in Central Europe, with Amazon (AMZN.O) launching its Prime service last month in Poland and Sea Ltd’s (SE.N) Shopee entering the country in September.
“Buyers will benefit from the improved selection, price and convenience, while a joint base of around 135,000 merchants will be able to ‘list once, sell everywhere’,” Allegro Chief Executive Francois Nuyts said in a statement.