You have already heard of MakeMyTrip being listed on the NYSE. Another startup, Drivezy, is now planning to go public and it may do so in either Japan or the US. The company’s promoter says there is one obvious reason they cannot think of floating a public offer of their shares in India; a company needs to be in profit for three years before selling its shares to the public. The other reason specific to Drivezy is that their existing investors are either from Japan or from the US. This is why the startup is considering these options.
Drivezy is a vehicle rental platform based out of Bengaluru and currently has a fleet of around 15,000 bikes and 4,000 cars. They have their operations in 11 cities. The two major areas of investment for Drivezy are in the purchase of these vehicles and in renting out the spaces for parking them. The company has borrowed heavily to fund these and the IPO it floats will help raise funds to improve its running costs. The regular costs include the maintenance of the vehicles and the rentals paid to the owners of the parking spaces across the cities.
In terms of fundraising, the startup has so far raised $40 million and the key investors are Das Capital, Y Combinator and White Unicorn Ventures. Apart from this, the startup has floated a special purpose vehicle, Harbourfront Capital which has availed a $100 million fund for purchasing the vehicles for which there is an agreement with AnyPayin.
As you would have read in these columns, there is increasing pressure from marquee investors for Indian startups to start making profits and go public as soon as possible. Startups which have taken upon themselves to do this in the near future include Ola, OYO, Freshworks and Urban Ladder, among others.