 "Uber joins forces with SK Telecom to crack tough South Korea market")
By Joyce Lee and Hyunjoo Jin
SEOUL (Reuters) - Uber Technologies said on Friday it will invest more than $150 million in a joint venture and partnership with South Korea's SK Telecom Co Ltd <017670.KS>, which is proposing to split off its mobility business.
The move is Uber's latest attempt to expand in a market where it has faced tough competition, opposition from taxi drivers and regulations which forced it to stop using private cars for its ride-hailing service in 2015.
The U.S. ride-hailing company currently offers premium taxi-hailing and registered taxi-hailing services in South Korea, a market dominated by local player Kakao's <035720.KS> mobility unit.
The new joint venture would "create opportunities in the taxi-hailing market in Korea and explore new areas, including future mobility services," Uber and SK Telecom said in a joint statement.
Under the plan, SK Telecom would split off its mobility services including satellite navigation and taxi-hailing into a new company called T Map Mobility, which Uber would then back with a direct investment of $50 million and another $100 million in a joint venture structure, the companies said.
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Subject to regulatory approval, the joint venture is expected to begin operations in the first half of 2021, the statement said.
The joint venture would combine T Map Mobility's "network of drivers and mapping technology with Uber's ride-hailing technology and global operations expertise," it added.
It is expected to launch a co-branded platform, which riders and drivers of T Map Taxi will be encouraged to join after the launch. T Map Taxi is SK Telecom's taxi-hailing platform, the second-largest in Korea after Kakao with 750,000 monthly active users. Its T Map satellite navigation platform is Korea's largest with 13 million monthly active users.
Uber will own 51% of the joint venture, while T Map Mobility will hold the remaining 49%.
SK Telecom said it expected T Map Mobility, valued at about 1 trillion won ($873.3 million), to grow into a company worth 4.5 trillion won by 2025.
(Reporting by Joyce Lee and Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by Stephen Coates)