Ola's fundraising spree continues: Raises $50 million from New York-based Tekne Capital

This increased investor interest in Ola comes at a time when rival Uber has been tangled in a series of controversies.
Ola's fundraising spree continues: Raises $50 million from New York-based Tekne Capital
Ola's fundraising spree continues: Raises $50 million from New York-based Tekne Capital
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Homegrown taxi aggregator Ola’s fundraising streak continues. After raising over Rs 600 crore from RNT Capital Advisors and other investors, reports suggest that it has now raised $50 million from Takne Capital Management.

According to an Economic Times report, the New York-based hedge fund Tekne Capital Management has infused capital into Ola as part of its ongoing round, which has seen participation from Ratan Tata's venture fund RNT Capital Advisors and US hedge fund Falcon Edge.

Tekne Capital is a technology-focused hedge fund founded by Beeneet Kothari.

A source told ET that Ola continues to be in talks with various investors, including Coatue Management for this round.

This new infusion of capital will push Ola's valuation to about $3.65 billion, and ET reports says it will continue to raise capital.

According to the report, this strong momentum of fund raising comes after Ola raised capital at a lower valuation of $3 billion from SoftBank in November last year. This is down from $4.5-5 billion back in 2015.

However, Ola has since then started gaining back market share.

In the fiercely competitive cab aggregator market in India, Ola is the market leader with about 65% market share, which Uber holding the rest.

Ola has been growing aggressively with a presence in over 100 cities. It is also working with the government to introduce an electric fleet.

This increased investor interest in Ola comes at a time when rival Uber has been tangled in a series of controversies, with an investigation ongoing into the complaints regarding sexual harassment and company culture. Uber has also been slapped with an intellectual property lawsuit from Google's parent Alphabet-owned Waymo. More recently, the company fired 20 employees including Asia business Eric Alexander for obtaining medical report of a woman who was raped by an Uber driver in Delhi.

Following the law firm’s report on the company, Uber’s CEO Travis Kalanick took a three month leave of absence. Additionally, business head Emil Michael was also asked to leave. 

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