Pacific Money | Economy | Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia’s Grab Finally Turns a Profit

Under mounting pressure from shareholders, the app finally broke into the black for the first time last year.

Southeast Asian super-app Grab achieved a significant milestone in 2025: for the first time since going public, it recorded a net profit. While audited financial results have yet to be released, the ride-hailing and delivery giant released preliminary earnings for 2025, showing it turned a full-year profit of $200 million.

Grab has been on a path toward profitability for some time, with losses narrowing from over $1.7 billion in 2022 to just $158 million in 2024. Last year, the firm, which is headquartered in Singapore but listed on the Nasdaq, finally pushed into the black.

How did they do it? Massive market share across Southeast Asia. The total value of delivery and ride-hailing transactions conducted through the app increased 21 percent year over year, from $18 billion in 2024 to $22 billion in 2025. Monthly users increased as well, from 41 million to 47 million.

This led to an increase in revenue of around 20 percent. In total, the company brought in nearly $3.4 billion in 2025. With operating expenses remaining tightly controlled, Grab finally joined its regional competitor Sea (parent company of Shopee) in the profit column.

Interestingly, while the company turned a profit, its cash from operations actually decreased. In 2024, operating cash flow was $852 million. Last year, it shrank to just $79 million. According to Grab, this is because they stepped up digital financing activities, with their loan portfolio jumping 120 percent to nearly $1.2 billion by the end of 2025.

This evidently strained their operating cash flow as money was paid out to new borrowers. Of course, as with many tech unicorns, cash is not really a problem for Grab. Despite accumulated losses of $17.5 billion on their balance sheet, Grab ended the year with almost $3.5 billion in cash on hand.

Grab’s path toward profitability reflects broader trends in Southeast Asia’s consumer-facing tech ecosystem. Go-Jek, Grab, and Sea all burst onto the scene about a decade ago, sucking up huge flows of venture capital while expanding their market share and losing enormous amounts of money. In short order, each of these companies went public: Grab and Sea in the United States and Go-Jek in Indonesia.

But being publicly listed exposed them to ever greater scrutiny. Under pressure from shareholders, they started cutting expenses in an effort to convert their dominant market position into a profitable business model. Sea reached profitability first, mainly because losses in e-commerce have been offset by its profitable gaming arm.

Grab, which has no similarly profitable segment to cross-subsidize losses in delivery and ride-hailing, had to eke out profits the old-fashioned way: through intense competition with rivals like Go-Jek, making adjustments to its revenue and business model and cutting expenses. Last year, it finally joined Sea in the ranks of profitable Southeast Asian tech giants.

The other thing we are seeing is that digital finance is becoming an increasingly important part of the business model. Grab and Go-Jek both started as ride-hailing and delivery apps, gradually adding digital financial services. Now Grab’s loan portfolio is over $1 billion, and it is backing one of the region’s larger digital banks.

Both Sea and Go-Jek have their own digital banks as well, which are also competing for market share. Deliveries and ride-hailing helped these platforms become indispensable to many consumers across the region, but the path to sustainable profits may ultimately run through services with higher margins like digital finance.

The other thing Grab is doing now that it’s in the black is trying to consolidate its market position by buying its main competitor. Rumors of Grab’s intention to acquire GoTo, parent company of Go-Jek, for around $7 billion have been in the air for some time. The merger talk got a shot in the arm recently when Indonesian state-owned investment fund Danantara indicated it might be keen on a deal as long as it retained some control or ownership in the new entity. We will have to wait and see how it all plays out.

But if Go-Jek and Grab were to merge, it would drastically remake the consumer-facing tech ecosystem in Southeast Asia. The long game here was always to expand market share even at a loss, then pivot to efficiency and profits later. We are currently in the pivot phase, with Grab and Go-Jek competing quite intensely to offer incentives and improved services to users.

If Grab were to acquire Go-Jek, this competitive market pressure would not only evaporate, it would leave in its wake just a single ride-hailing and delivery behemoth straddling the region (there are others, but a merged Go-Jek Grab entity would dwarf them). Given that Grab has only just now finally turned a rather modest profit, after many years of careful cost-cutting and under competitive market pressure, one can see why, if offered the choice, they would prefer to simply acquire their main rival.

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Southeast Asian super-app Grab achieved a significant milestone in 2025: for the first time since going public, it recorded a net profit. While audited financial results have yet to be released, the ride-hailing and delivery giant released preliminary earnings for 2025, showing it turned a full-year profit of $200 million.

Grab has been on a path toward profitability for some time, with losses narrowing from over $1.7 billion in 2022 to just $158 million in 2024. Last year, the firm, which is headquartered in Singapore but listed on the Nasdaq, finally pushed into the black.

How did they do it? Massive market share across Southeast Asia. The total value of delivery and ride-hailing transactions conducted through the app increased 21 percent year over year, from $18 billion in 2024 to $22 billion in 2025. Monthly users increased as well, from 41 million to 47 million.

This led to an increase in revenue of around 20 percent. In total, the company brought in nearly $3.4 billion in 2025. With operating expenses remaining tightly controlled, Grab finally joined its regional competitor Sea (parent company of Shopee) in the profit column.

Interestingly, while the company turned a profit, its cash from operations actually decreased. In 2024, operating cash flow was $852 million. Last year, it shrank to just $79 million. According to Grab, this is because they stepped up digital financing activities, with their loan portfolio jumping 120 percent to nearly $1.2 billion by the end of 2025.

This evidently strained their operating cash flow as money was paid out to new borrowers. Of course, as with many tech unicorns, cash is not really a problem for Grab. Despite accumulated losses of $17.5 billion on their balance sheet, Grab ended the year with almost $3.5 billion in cash on hand.

Grab’s path toward profitability reflects broader trends in Southeast Asia’s consumer-facing tech ecosystem. Go-Jek, Grab, and Sea all burst onto the scene about a decade ago, sucking up huge flows of venture capital while expanding their market share and losing enormous amounts of money. In short order, each of these companies went public: Grab and Sea in the United States and Go-Jek in Indonesia.

But being publicly listed exposed them to ever greater scrutiny. Under pressure from shareholders, they started cutting expenses in an effort to convert their dominant market position into a profitable business model. Sea reached profitability first, mainly because losses in e-commerce have been offset by its profitable gaming arm.

Grab, which has no similarly profitable segment to cross-subsidize losses in delivery and ride-hailing, had to eke out profits the old-fashioned way: through intense competition with rivals like Go-Jek, making adjustments to its revenue and business model and cutting expenses. Last year, it finally joined Sea in the ranks of profitable Southeast Asian tech giants.

The other thing we are seeing is that digital finance is becoming an increasingly important part of the business model. Grab and Go-Jek both started as ride-hailing and delivery apps, gradually adding digital financial services. Now Grab’s loan portfolio is over $1 billion, and it is backing one of the region’s larger digital banks.

Both Sea and Go-Jek have their own digital banks as well, which are also competing for market share. Deliveries and ride-hailing helped these platforms become indispensable to many consumers across the region, but the path to sustainable profits may ultimately run through services with higher margins like digital finance.

The other thing Grab is doing now that it’s in the black is trying to consolidate its market position by buying its main competitor. Rumors of Grab’s intention to acquire GoTo, parent company of Go-Jek, for around $7 billion have been in the air for some time. The merger talk got a shot in the arm recently when Indonesian state-owned investment fund Danantara indicated it might be keen on a deal as long as it retained some control or ownership in the new entity. We will have to wait and see how it all plays out.

But if Go-Jek and Grab were to merge, it would drastically remake the consumer-facing tech ecosystem in Southeast Asia. The long game here was always to expand market share even at a loss, then pivot to efficiency and profits later. We are currently in the pivot phase, with Grab and Go-Jek competing quite intensely to offer incentives and improved services to users.

If Grab were to acquire Go-Jek, this competitive market pressure would not only evaporate, it would leave in its wake just a single ride-hailing and delivery behemoth straddling the region (there are others, but a merged Go-Jek Grab entity would dwarf them). Given that Grab has only just now finally turned a rather modest profit, after many years of careful cost-cutting and under competitive market pressure, one can see why, if offered the choice, they would prefer to simply acquire their main rival.

James Guild is an expert in trade, finance, and economic development in Southeast Asia.

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