Grocery delivery platform Oasis valuation tops $650 mn; eyes US expansion

South Korea-based grocery delivery platform Oasis Corp., referred to as Oasis Market, has attracted 50 billion won ($44 million) from global private equity firm Unison Capital, raising its valuation to around 750 billion won, according to the company on July 7.

The company's valuation has nearly doubled in just three months. Earlier in March, Oasis Market fetched a valuation of 315 billion won when it raised 15 billion won from venture capital firms. And just last year in April, the company's valuation had stood at around 150 billion won when it attracted investment from Korea Investment Partners.

So far, the company has raised a total of 86.6 billion won. Its strategic investor includes Kakao Investment.

Founded in 2011, Oasis Market first began as an offline business that sold organic food products and launched an online shopping platform to offer early morning delivery services in 2018. Since then, the company has become one of the country's three major early morning grocery delivery platforms -- positioned as a rival to Market Kurly, Korea's leading online grocery and gourmet food delivery service.

Among the early morning grocery delivery platforms, Oasis Market is considered to be the only profitable company.

The company logged an operating profit of 9.7 billion won in 2020, about a tenfold increase compared to the year-earlier period. Its performance has grabbed much attention given that its bigger rivals such as Market Kurly and SSG.com posted operating losses of 116.2 billion won and 46.9 billion won, respectively.

Meanwhile, Oasis Market has been preparing to foray into the US market with its parent company, Gaeasoft Corp., filing a patent application for logistics solutions in the US. The company has also been ramping up its domestic business by setting up smart logistics centers across Korea.

Write to Jong-woo Kim at jongwoo@hankyung.com
Danbee Lee edited this article.