Singapore — On Thursday, Singapore threatened to reverse the sale of Uber’s Southeast Asian business to Grab, calling for changes to be made to the deal, which it said infringed competition rules. In March, Singapore-based Grab agreed to buy Uber’s food-and ride-hailing business in Southeast Asia, ending a bruising battle between the ride-hailing companies. But Singapore’s competition commission found that the deal created a virtual monopoly in the city state’s ride-hailing market, with Grab raising prices after the merger was completed, it said in a statement. The Competition and Consumer Commission of Singapore (CCCS) criticised both companies for going ahead with the "irreversible" deal despite restrictions imposed in March to pause the transaction while an anti-competition probe was underway.
"CCCS’s investigations also revealed that the parties had even provided for a mechanism to apportion eventual anti-trust financial penalties," the statement said. The commission asked...
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