RapoLabs, the operator of the fashion platform Queenit for consumers in their 40s and 50s, is expanding its footprint into T-commerce through an acquisition of SK Stoa. If RapoLabs acquires SK Stoa, it would become a large fashion platform with sales of 373.4 billion won.

RapoLabs applied on Jan. 23 to the Korea Communications Commission for approval to change SK Stoa’s largest shareholder. Earlier, RapoLabs signed a share purchase agreement to buy for about 110 billion won 100 percent of the stakes in SK Stoa and Media S held by SK Telecom.

The review is to be completed within 60 days of receiving the application, with an extension of up to 30 days. It is expected to take more than three months when document supplementation is taken into account.

RapoLabs’ move to acquire SK Stoa is based on its judgment that mobile alone has limits in attracting consumers in their 40s and 50s. Queenit aims to become an integrated lifestyle platform for those age groups, but their main online shopping channel remains TV home shopping. In fact, more than 80 percent of total T-commerce sales comes from consumers in their 40s and 60s.

RapoLabs’ strategy is to secure its target customer base through T-commerce and then steer them to mobile to expand profitability. The TV home shopping and T-commerce industry has already expanded mobile platforms after factoring in transmission fees, and CJ OnStyle and GS Shop have raised the mobile share to 50 to 60 percent.

Queenit says the deal would be a complementary integration with SK Stoa. Queenit has 3 million active customers and data-based hyper-personalised recommendation technology, while SK Stoa has product sourcing and programming and production capabilities. Their sales areas also overlap little. Queenit has focused on fashion and beauty, while SK Stoa has focused on food, health functional foods and living. Queenit also says it will have no difficulty complying with regulations requiring more than 70 percent of T-commerce programming to be filled with products from small and medium-sized companies, because 95 percent of its sellers are small merchants.

As of 2024, sales at RapoLabs and SK Stoa were 71.1 billion won and 302.3 billion won, respectively. In the same year, among major fashion platforms, Musinsa posted sales of 1.24 trillion won, ABLY recorded 334.3 billion won and Zigzag recorded 200.3 billion won. Their main targets are consumers in their 20s and 30s.

RapoLabs also expects the acquisition of SK Stoa to improve its profit and loss structure. In 2024, RapoLabs posted an operating loss of 8.0 billion won, while SK Stoa posted an operating profit of 8.1 billion won.

The company said RapoLabs has analysed the home shopping industry for several years and reviewed the complementary nature of TV and mobile. It said it will apply Queenit customer data to SK Stoa programming to innovate into data-based T-commerce.