Coupang ended its 10-minute Tokyo pilot and left Japan for Korea and Taiwan

Coupang is Korea's largest e-commerce company, known for its Rocket Delivery logistics.

That Coupang's ultrafast, store-adjacent delivery model could transplant into Tokyo's key districts

Coupang launched its Japanese pilot in June 2021, delivering food and household goods during the pandemic delivery boom.

Two years on, demand had cooled. Professor Suh Yong-gu said ultrafast services appeared to have failed to appeal to Japanese consumers — the 'Satori generation' of young people is wary of new services — and that Japan's konbini, almost three times bigger than Korea's, already serve most daily needs, leaving little demand for delivery. Baemin had withdrawn from Japan in 2021 after five months, selling its Japanese unit to foodpanda.

The pilot ended on 21 March 2023. Coupang refocused on the domestic Korean market — seen heading toward 700 trillion won ($530B) by 2025, where its share was 'not big enough' — and on Taiwan, where Korean-made products are popular and online shopping demand is fast growing.

A two-year pilot that never expanded beyond two Tokyo wards answered the expansion question empirically: trial results, not ambition, drove the exit.

Japan's konbini network is a delivery substitute baked into daily life, compressing the addressable need for ultrafast e-commerce.

With Korea's own market still under-penetrated and Taiwan adjacent in taste, redeploying the capital had a higher expected return than persisting in Japan.

Delivery-market structure beats delivery technology: where convenience stores already solve daily top-ups and consumer culture dampens new-service adoption, speed alone doesn't create a market.

Coupang folded Japan into its Korea-and-Taiwan growth focus from March 2023; the company declined to elaborate further on its Japan business.