Zoomcar raises debt from WeWork India's CEO Karan Virwani

Self-drive car rental space has become mainstream with increasing acceptance of players such as Zoomcar, Drivezy and Ola across the country. 

With a growing scale, the segment is also attracting the interest of SoftBank and Amazon. Drivezy reportedly held a conversation to raise fund from the Japenese investment giant and the global e-commerce major in March. 

Sensing an ancillary but significant opportunity, Ola, an existing and long term SoftBank's portfolio also launched self-drive car rental service. Last month, Entrackr had exclusively reported about Ola's entry into a self-drive rental segment.

No doubt, the self-drive four-wheel segment has been turning competitive. As a result, every operating firm requires to keep raising capital. While Zoomcar is eyeing to corner over $500 million equity round, it continues to raise debt and equity capital from the parent entity on regular intervals. 

The Bengaluru-based firm has raised yet another round mix of debt and equity to the tune of Rs 55.7 crore. This time, WeWork’s India CEO Karan Virwani has participated in the round with Rs 7.53 crore loan.

According to RoC filing with MCA, Zoomcar's board had passed a resolution on October 4 to allot 97,604 equity shares to the parent entity at a price of Rs 4,966 per share. On October 9, the company had passed another resolution to allot 720 unsecured optionally convertible debentures of Rs 100,00 each to Virwani.

With this fund infusion, the company has raised Rs 120 crore since January 2019 from the likes of Mahindra, Blacksoil Capital, and Trifecta. 

At present, Zoomcar serves across 50 Indian cities with a fleet of 10,000 cars on the platform. Besides self-drive rentals, its shared subscription marketplace model is leading to a mindset shift, where people increasingly prefer subscription access over full ownership of a car.

According to a recent report, Zoomcar had already hit 15,000 car subscription run-rate through its shared mobility platform in August, which is only behind Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai Motor India in terms of volume. It partnered with Nissan, Toyota, Volkswagen, and Renault to offer subscription-based service.