Can Southeast Asia’s Super-App Rivals Unite to Build a $100B Tech Giant?

Southeast Asia has always been on the fore front for tech investors. With a young, tech-savvy population of over 700 million, rapid urbanisation, and an underdeveloped traditional services sector, the region seems destined for digital disruption.

Yet reality has been a tougher ride.

Two of the region’s most recognisable tech titans Singapore-based Grab and Indonesia’s GoTo has both the promise and the pain of Southeast Asia’s tech economy.

Grab started life as a ride-hailing service, but quickly expanded into food delivery, digital wallets, and a suite of other services, transforming into a super-app.

In December 2021, Grab made a blockbuster debut on the Nasdaq with a $40 billion valuation.

But surprisingly within a year, rising interest rates, investor impatience, and subsequent losses sent its value tumbling to just above $10 billion.

GoTo is another app with a similar path.

Established in 2021 due to the combination of ride hailing and payments app called Gojek and Tokopedia an ecommerce app.

GoTo promised to be Indonesia’s all-in-one digital ecosystem. It debuted on the Jakarta Stock Exchange in April 2022 at a $28 billion valuation only to see three-quarters of that value wiped out within a year.

According to reports both establishment Grab and GoTo wants to merge together.

This ambitious move could create a superpower especially when it comes to ride hailing, food delivery, e-commerce, and payments services.

On paper, combining forces could mean more market share, efficiency, and the kind of scale needed to compete with other rivals like China’s Meituan or even global giants such as Uber.

But that's not all. Indonesia’s government has raised concerns about such a merger, since it could reduce competition and concentrate too much economic power in foreign hands.

Regulations can be an obstacle, due to Indonesia’s focus on building local and homegrown tech giants.