SoftBank, Amazon In Talks To Lead $100 Mn Funding Round In Drivezy

SoftBank and ecommerce giant Amazon are reportedly in talks to lead a $100 Mn (INR 690 Cr) equity financing round in Bengaluru-based vehicle-sharing marketplace Drivezy.

Drivezy has been on the lookout for fresh funds to expand its fleet across the country and also foray into the foreign markets.

Citing unnamed sources, an ET report said that Amazon’s bet in the company is likely to be based on Drivezy ’s meta-search platform, Rayy. Focussing more on the technological aspect, Amazon may be looking to leverage Drivezy’s Rayy which allows manufacturers, individuals to list products, ranging from shoes to two-wheelers, on its platform. It also allows users to share or rent the listed products.

Speculations are also rife that SoftBank may bet on the company through its $100 Bn Vision Fund. The deal can be expected to be a mix of both equity and debt financing.

Drivezy was founded in 2015 by Ashwarya Pratap Singh, Hemant Kumar Sah, Vasant Verma, Abhishek Mahajan, and Amit Sahu. Drivezy offers peer-to-peer bike and car sharing service. Currently, Drivezy is present in 11 cities with a fleet of  4,000 cars and 15K scooters.

The platform allows individual vehicle owners to list their idle cars, motorcycles and scooters and earn money by renting the vehicles to customers. Customers can rent a car or a two-wheeler from Drivezy for hourly, daily, weekly and monthly basis.

Prior to this, the startup had raised $20 Mn (INR 138 Cr) in Series B equity funding, led by existing investor Das Capital in November 2018. Along with equity, it also secured $100 Mn (INR 690 Cr) in an asset financing deal using which the company plans to induct over 50K vehicles.  According to the startup, it has raised over $35 Mn in equity financing to date.

The vehicle-sharing platform has also raised an estimated $128 Mn (INR 884 Cr) in asset financing to date.

A Statista report predicted that revenue in the ride-sharing segment is expected to show an annual growth rate of 19.6%, resulting in a market of $761 Mn by 2022. Further, a study by the global research organisation, World Resources Institute (WRI), found that India’s car-sharing industry is growing rapidly and it could potentially reduce car ownership in the long term.

Currently, it competes with other taxi aggregators and ridesharing startups like Ola, Uber, Bounce, LetsRide, PoolCircle, ZoomCar, Carzonrent, Wunder, and Ryde among others.

Drivezy was part of the 2018 edition of the most coveted list of India’s most innovative startups — 42Next by Inc42.