Vietnam's Competition Council (VCC) has ruled that Grab broke no competition laws when it acquired Uber.
According to Dealstreet Asia, the ruling stands in opposition to a December 2018 statement from the Vietnam Competition Authority (VCA) arguing that the deal was illegal because Grab failed to alert authorities to the accumulated market share the acquisition would result in. At the time of the merger, in March 2018, the VCA claimed that Grab would have over 50% market share, which violates regulations, while anything over 30% requires alerting relevant officials.
The VCA had made the case that once Grab absorbed Uber they had 82.68% of the ride hailing market in Saigon and 44.1% in Hanoi. Grab maintained their innocence from the beginning, arguing that officials had misinterpreted the data when calculating market share. Had they been found guilty, they would have faced a possible fine of 10% of their revenue from 2017 and potentially lost the right to operate in the country.
Other Southeast Asian nations have recently taken legal action against the ride-sharing behemoth over the region-wide deal. A watchdog group in the Philippines fined Grab and Uber a collective US$296,900 while Singapore levied a US$9 million dollar penalty.
Grab is currently appealing a court ruling to pay VinaSun a US$206,000 fine for unfair competition.
