Bike taxi platform Rapido has announced raising $120 million in a fresh funding round led by WestBridge Capital which catapulted it to India’s unicorn club.
According to media reports citing regulatory filings, the funding is part of Rapido’s Series E round. The Economic Times reported that Rapido is expected to raise another $20 million from global investors.
The company did not respond to a request for comment by DealStreetAsia.
Rapido, which competes with Uber and Ola, last raised $180 million in its Series D funding round led by food delivery giant Swiggy in 2022.
The round saw investment from two-wheeler maker TVS Motor Company, along with existing investors, Westbridge, Shell Ventures, and Nexus Ventures, the company said in a statement.
In August 2021, Rapido had last raised $52 million from investors including Shell Ventures, Yamaha, Kunal Shah (founder, CRED), Amarjit Singh Batra (CEO, Spotify India), and Positive Moves Consulting.
With the fundraising, Rapido has become the fourth company to have breached the $1-billion valuation mark in India this year, after Perfios, a fintech startup that collects data to help financial institutions make lending decisions, raised $80 million in a new funding round by Teachers’ Venture Growth.
Separately, in January, Krutrim, an AI startup established by Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal, became the first unicorn of 2024 after raising $50 million in its first funding round at a valuation of $1 billion.
In May, on-demand logistics startup Porter raised funds from friends and family in a round that catapulted it to the unicorn club of India, according to media reports.
Even as India has already added four startups to its unicorn club this year, compared with just two in 2023, it’s a far cry from the heady years of 2021-22.
Unicorn creation has been declining sharply year-on-year, with 24 private startups topping the billion-dollar mark in 2022, down from the record 45 in 2021, triggered by a slew of factors including monetary policy tightening worldwide, rising inflation, and global economic slowdown.
With valuations stabilising, the frenzy to enter the unicorn club also seems to have mellowed.
In a 2022 report, venture growth investor Iron Pillar had pegged India’s unicorn tally at more than 250 by 2025. Going by the current trend, the target now looks almost elusive.
