EV-ride hailing platform BluSmart secures $50 million to enhance its fleet
Electric ride-hailing platform BluSmart has announced that it has raised $50 million in a mix of equity and venture debt funding as the New Delhi-based company is looking to add 5,000 electric cars to its ride-hailing platform and scale up its electric vehicle (EV) hubs.
BluSmart, which claims to be India's largest operator of EV hubs, said it extended its Series A round, which started in September 2021, as Series A1 with total commitments of $50.7 million, the company said in a statement on May 24. In its Series A1 round, the company raised $25 million comprising $15 million in equity funding and $10 million as venture debt.
The equity funding was led by BP Ventures and Green Frontier Capital with participation from existing investors. The company had previously raised funds from venture capital firms like Inflection Point Ventures, Mumbai Angels Network, Venture Catalysts, JITO Foundation, and Hero MotoCorp among others. The venture debt funding, meanwhile, came from Stride Ventures, Alteria Capital, BlackSoil, and UCIC, BluSmart said.
BluSmart also recently secured India's largest EV financing of $35.7 million backed by IREDA (India Renewable Energy Dev Agency Ltd). BluSmart has now raised $75 million in EV asset financing.
BluSmart said it plans to use the funds to scale up its all-electric ride-hailing fleet to over 5,000 BluSmart EVs and expand its network of EV superhubs across the Delhi NCR (national capital region).
"BluSmart has been able to scale 25x since launch backed by its founding tenets of innovative supply-side differentiation (backed by institutional EV financing), customer-centric business model (zero ride denials and zero surge pricing), and full-stack EV ecosystem approach (fully electric ride-hailing fleet backed by large scale EV infrastructure)," said Anmol Jaggi, Co-founder and Chief Executive Operator, BluSmart.
"BluSmart is creating inclusive and equitable economic opportunities for driver-partners who can drive and earn without the hassles of asset ownership," Jaggi added.
