Nov 24, 2020

Frontier Digital Ventures interest expands in the Philippines with the acquisition of a direct competitor 24 November 2020 The Filipino property portal Hoppler has entered into an agreement for the 100% acquisition of direct rival ZipMatch for 10% of Hoppler’s issued capital and a cash consideration of $145k. As a 40% stakeholder in the business, the deal will see Frontier Digital Ventures’ position in the Filipino market consolidated as well as seeing that Hoppler’s sales force of brokers doubles as “the two most active transaction-based portals in the country come together”. Founded in 2012, ZipMatch is a property portal based in the Manila Metro area which has generated modest revenue figures over the last few years with 2019 seeing $220k and 2020’s revenues of $72k being heavily hit by Covid. Now as a consolidated entity ZipMatch is expected to benefit from what a press release called the “highly complementary nature of both businesses”. The acquisition of ZipMatch is the second such big M&A deal entered into by Frontier Digital Ventures in as many months after the company acquired leading classifieds titles Fincaraíz, Avito and Tayara from Adevinta in October . FDV’s Founder and CEO Shaun Di Gregorio has not ruled out further M&A activity. “The temporary COVID-19 period has created a number of compelling opportunities to strengthen our competitive position and broader portfolio. We continue to assess other value-accretive opportunities, with long-term value creation for shareholders very much front of mind.”