Carousell buys sneaker marketplace Ox Street to boost recommerce growth in SEA

Carousell Group has acquired Ox Street, an end-to-end marketplace for authenticated sneakers and streetwear in Southeast Asia. Following Carousell Group’s US$100 million investment from STIC Investments in September, this acquisition underpins the group’s strategic priority to accelerate its recommerce growth in Greater Southeast Asia. Ox Street will continue to operate as its own brand, retaining its name, platform, and team. According to Carousell, the acquisition will drive a synergistic partnership between the marketplaces.

The partnership reflects Carousell’s deep commitment to reimagining the classifieds experience, with a focus on trust and convenience, to make secondhand the first choice. The Ox Street team inspects and authenticates every pair of sneakers before it reaches its buyers. Carousell’s technology, reach, and marketplace liquidity across a wide range of categories, combined with Ox Street’s authentication capabilities will further propel the mutual goal of creating an experience where transacting secondhand is as convenient and trusted as buying first hand, the company said.

Leveraging Ox Street’s strong domain expertise in the streetwear industry, Carousell intends to deepen its reach and scale to become a market leader for fashion and luxury goods. It will also allow both marketplaces to capture the growth of the Greater Southeast Asian market across sneakers and more emerging categories driven by Gen Z trends.

Carousell's co-founder and CEO, Quek Siu Rui, said both companies share common values in being user-first and in building communities, as evidenced by the brand love Ox Street have created amongst their dedicated community of sneakerheads and fashion enthusiasts, especially amongst Gen Z.

"Ox Street has also built trust by authenticating every pair of sneakers that gets transacted on its marketplace. We see immense opportunity in bringing that capability and Ox Street's learnings to double down on our recommerce efforts. Most of all, we see this acquisition as joining forces to accelerate our shared vision of making secondhand the first choice," he added.

According to Quek, the conversation initially started with Carousell partnering up to provide authentication as a service for sneakers, but as discussions progressed, the team found so much common ground in how both companies see the future, that they decided it would be much more powerful for Ox Street to fully join the Carousell Group, Quek explained.

"Our focus markets align nearly one to one, and in these markets, Carousell was actually the first and remains the largest marketplace for sneakers and streetwear," he added. Meanwhile, Ox Street's founder and CEO, Gijs Verheijke, said with Carousell’s reach and technological capabilities, the company can supercharge its ability to innovate and reach more buyers and sellers.

Separately, the recent US$100 million funding will accelerate Carousell's leadership in the region, and enable Carousell to achieve its goal of redefining commerce for secondhand goods and automobiles in an increasingly digitally savvy, affluent and sustainability-conscious region.

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