Ola raises $250 Million from SoftBank at Lower Valuation

Posted on April 14, 2017

India’s largest Cab aggregator has raised Private Equity funding of $250 Million. Ola had secured the total of US$330 million in fresh funding, at a valuation of US$3.5 billion, 30 percent lower than its previous valuation as revealed by the documents filed with Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA).

Both Indian Major startups Flipkart and Ola were aggressively looking to raise funding, in order to compete with their US-Based Uber and Amazon. Both the two Indian companies have a common investor, US hedge fund Tiger Global.

Earlier this week, Flipkart raised a mammoth $1.4 billion from Tencent, eBay and Microsoft in a down round. Flipkart’s valuation fell to $11.6 billion from $15 billion on a post-money basis.

Last time when Ola got funding was in November 2015 from Scottish investment firm Baillie Gifford and China’s Didi Kuaidi, besides some existing investors including SoftBank Group.

The Bengaluru-based startup, founded in 2011, covers 102 cities in the country compared to Uber’s 28, and has registered 500,000 vehicles on its platform and has the wider range of vehicle than its competitor Uber.

However, Ola and SoftBank both declined to comment anything about the deal.

According to a source, Ola revenue rose seven times to Rs.380.2 crore in FY 2014-15 from Rs.49.6 crore in FY 2013-14. But its net loss also widened to Rs.754.8 crore from Rs.34.2 crore, as total expenditure surged 14 times to Rs.1,173 crore.

Ola, which was India’s third-most valuable Internet start-up, is likely to retain its position despite the down-round. Read more about Indian Startup Ecosystem.

Ola raises $250 Million from SoftBank at Lower Valuation