Grab says Uber take-over in good faith, amid advanced probe

Grab Holdings says its acquisition of rival Uber last year was done in good faith, and that it was not aware of any breaches of Malaysian competition laws.

The Edge cited a Grab spokesperson as saying that it had also fully cooperated with the Malaysia Competition Commission's (MyCC) requests for information.

This was in response to a Bloomberg report yesterday that MyCC was stepping up its probe into Grab, which was initiated last year.

However, MyCC chief executive officer Iskandar Ismail did not detail what steps the commission was taking.

The Competition Act empowers MyCC to probe mergers which result in monopolies.

Previously, Singapore had fined Grab and Uber a combined S$13 million over the merger, for significantly reducing competition in the e-hailing sector.

Grab's takeover of Uber in March last year saw the two companies merging their operations throughout Southeast Asia.

In Malaysia, the merger made Grab the dominant e-hailing provider in the country, although there are other service providers such as MyCar.

Grab's biggest rival in the region, Gojek, is also set to make a foray into the country.