According to regulatory filings, the US-based online cab hailing service, Uber Technologies Inc has increased the size of its recent Series E round of venture financing by $1 Bn, bringing the total funding round to $2.8 Bn.
Uber has recently raised $1.2 Bn in Series E round from a group of unnamed investors. However, The Wall Street Journal reports says that the New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Middle East sovereign wealth fund, Qatar Investment Authority, had participated in the round. US-based Valiant Capital Partners and Lone Pine Capital had also co-invested in the round that valued Uber at $40 billion.
Earlier in July last year, the company had raised $1.2 Bn in funding from Fidelity Investments, Wellington Management, BlackRock Inc, Summit Partners, Kleiner Perkins, Google Ventures, and Menlo Ventures. Prior to that, Uber had raised over $361.2 Mn in funding led by Google Ventures, which injected in $258 Mn.
Uber was launched in 2009 and headquartered in San Francisco. It is the most heavily-funded online car hire services in the world. It enables users to request a ride any time using its app, as well as from its mobile site m.uber.com.
In India, the company is operational since October 2013 and is already present in 11 cities — Bangalore, Chandigarh, Chennai, Jaipur, New Delhi, Pune, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Kochi.
Recently, Uber has also applied for a radio taxi licence and assured more safe and reliable transportation services following allegations that one of its driver raped a female passenger. The company has also faced a ban in national capital for almost one and half month.
Later, the Delhi transport department had modified the state radio taxi laws to bring the online car aggregators under the ambit of the scheme, and imposed a ban on mobile-based car hiring company after rape incident.
If market reports are to believed Uber is in talks to buy a majority stake in radio taxi provider Meru Cabs in order to boost its market share in India.
