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"British online retailer Play.com has today been purchased by Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten in a \u00A325 million cash deal. Rakuten will purchase 100% of outstanding Play.com stock from its current shareholders, with the deal expected to reach completion in early October.  The company said that the deal represents a &amp;quot;significant step&amp;quot; in its European and global expansion. It is the third such acquisition by the firm following deals for France&amp;#039;s PriceMinister and German online shopping mall Tradoria.  Rakuten now operates e-commerce businesses in ten countries globally, including Japan. Founded in 1998 in Jersey, Play.com is one of the UK&amp;#039;s largest online retailers, with 14 million registered users and 7m listed products at any one time, including books, DVDs and consumer electronics.  The website was never able to unseat American giant Amazon as the leading online retailer, but Ratuken has clearly seen opportunities for growth with the site.  The UK e-commerce industry is the largest in Europe and is expected to be worth more than \u00A335 billion by 2014, according to research by Euromonitor, Forrester Research, and MasterCard.  Hiroshi Mikitani, chairman and chief executive of Rakuten, said: &amp;quot;The UK market is one of Europe&amp;#039;s largest and most mature e-commerce markets. Play.com is not only a pioneer in the market, but also one of the UK&amp;#039;s most successful e-commerce businesses.  &amp;quot;We aim to leverage our e-commerce strength and experience to further expand and develop Play.com&amp;#039;s business model and channel its loyal user base, merchants, and deep product offerings into Rakuten&amp;#039;s global e-commerce network.&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/media/news/a341548/playcom-bought-by-japanese-firm-rakuten-for-25m/>