Founded in 1996 and headquartered in São Paulo, Ikeda provides retailers with a SaaS e-commerce platform, enabling its customers to help build their desired features and provides advisory services to support their online retail operations.
Ikeda currently provides services to over 100 major retailers located all over Brazil.
For Rakuten, it’s a way to expand into South America rapidly. Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Tokyo, Rakuten provides a variety of consumer and business-focused services including e-commerce, travel, banking, securities, credit card and e-money solutions.
There appears to be a trend for big retailers around the world to expand internationally and go online. Walmart in China also recently made major moves into the online retail market in China.
Read more here: http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/07/jap…8TechCrunch%29