JD.com considers £2bn bid for UK online retailer Very Group – report

Chinese e-commerce institution JD.com is weighing a imaginable connection for UK online retailer The Very Group successful a transaction that could beryllium worthy astir £2bn ($2.70bn), Sky News reported.

Operating nether the Very and Littlewoods brands, The Very Group is preparing to participate a ceremonial auction aft undergoing a fiscal restructuring that handed ownership power to US backstage equity institution Carlyle earlier this year.

Having been a long-standing creditor to the business, Carlyle assumed power for a nominal £1 pursuing the assignment of PricewaterhouseCoopers to negociate the insolvency of VGL Holdco successful November.

Carlyle had antecedently committed respective 100 cardinal pounds to Very Group's superior structure, including an £85m injection successful 2024, gathering connected an archetypal concern made successful 2021.

Very Group, formerly known arsenic Shop Direct, records yearly gross of much than £2bn and counts 4.4 cardinal customers crossed categories, including fashion, electricals, homewares and toys.

The concern besides operates a user concern division.

The Barclay household held the concern for implicit 2 decades, having acquired it – past trading arsenic Littlewoods – for £750m successful 2002.

Among the retailer's existing creditors are UAE-based media radical IMI, which holds a lending presumption successful the business, and UK-based money Arini, which extended a £600m indebtedness to the institution past year.

Very Group is presently chaired by erstwhile Conservative chancellor Nadhim Zahawi.

The quality comes arsenic marketplace quality concern GlobalData – genitor institution of Retail Insight Network – cautioned past week that The Very Group's manner part remains nether strain contempt the retailer returning to wide gross growth.

Fashion and sports income declined 4.5% successful the 39 weeks to 28 March 2026, with GlobalData retail expert Ashley Adeyemi noting that the conception continues to "drag the class into antagonistic territory".

Meanwhile, JD.com, which is listed connected Nasdaq, has been attracting regulatory scrutiny successful Europe implicit abstracted woody activity.

Last month, the European Union contention authorities launched a reappraisal into whether the company's projected $2.5bn acquisition of German user electronics radical Ceconomy whitethorn person progressive overseas authorities support.

The European Commission has acceptable 28 May arsenic the deadline for its preliminary appraisal of that transaction.

Austrian regulators had already delayed their support of the Ceconomy woody successful March, leaving the broader acquisition successful a precarious position.

The institution has besides precocious moved into the UK marketplace with the motorboat of its Joybuy online buying platform.