Sachin Bansal, the co-founder of Flipkart, has invested $21 million in homegrown ride-hailing major Ola. This investment is a part of an ongoing Series J round. The round has come within a few days of $73.97 million fresh infusion from Steadview Capital, as per research data platform paper.vc.
So far, the company has closed about $95 million in Series J round. The round is still open and the firm is likely to raise more capital in the ongoing round. Bansal has put in money in Ola at a valuation of about $5.7 billion. He paid same share price as the previous investment by Steadview Capital.
The investment from Bansal seems to be a tranche of $100 million he vouched for the SoftBank-backed firm.
Importantly, this is the third round of funding in Ola this year. Besides Steadview, the company had raised Rs 14 crore from Chinese scooter making company Eternal Yield International.
The proceeds are likely to be used for ramping up electric vehicle vertical and Foodpanda.
The back to back fresh rounds in Ola has come after SoftBank’s strong interest to invest in the company while its co-founder Bhavish Aggarwal is looking to raise capital from other investors to restrict the increasing stakes of the Masayoshi Son-led investment behemoth.
Apart from mobility solution and online food ordering, Ola is eyeing medicine delivery segment and was reportedly in talks with Myra Medicine for a possible acquisition. The firm had already entered scooter rental segment through investment in scooter-sharing platform Vogo.
Update: We have updated the headline to reflect that $21 million is a part of larger $100 million round committed to Ola by Sachin Bansal.
