Returning investors commit $19 mn to shared mobility startup Vogo

Bengaluru-based scooter sharing company Vogo Automotive is in the process of raising $19 million (Rs 138 crore at current exchange rates) in a Series C round from Lightstone Global Fund and venture capital firms Kalaari Capital and Matrix Partners. 

The company will raise Rs 138 crore by issuing 96,939 preferential shares to the investors, regulatory filings showed.

So far, Vogo has raised a little over $40 million in funding, according to data available with VCCEdge. In January 2019, the company raised $8.9 million in a funding round from Kalaari Capital, Matrix Partners, Stellaris Venture Partners and Hero Group promoter Pawan Munjal’s family trust. 

Vogo has also raised nearly $5 million in debt from venture debt firm Alteria Capital — $3.6million in June 2019 and $1.1 million in October 2018.

In 2018, Vogo raised $7 million from ride-hailing major Ola. The latter subsequently also announced a $100 million investment in Vogo. The deal also included making the scooters on Vogo’s platform available on Ola. 

In the financial year 2018-19, Vogo’s losses widened losses to Rs 39.2 crore from Rs 3.3 crore in the previous year as its cash burn rose eight times to Rs 46.3 crore from Rs 5.4 crore.

Vogo was founded in 2016 by Anand Ayyadurai, Padmanabhan Balakrishnan and Sanchit Mittal. It operates an automated pickup-and-drop scooter rental platform tracking the scooters in real-time. As per latest data available, Vogo has operations across 500 points in cities such as Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Mysore and Manipal. Users on its platform have completed over three million trips, it has claimed. 

Competition in the scooter rental space has accelerated over the past few months. In January this year, Wickedride Adventures-owned Bounce raised $97 million in a Series D round led by Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin along with Alpha Wave Ventures and Chiratae Ventures founder and MD Bruno E Raschle and existing venture capital firms.

In August 2019, TechCircle had reported that Bounce was in talks to raise $200 million in funding, of which it had already raised $120 million. Bounce has overall raised $190 million so far.