Ola posts an over sevenfold jump in revenues in FY15

TAXI and autorickshaw aggregator Ola has reported a turnover of R380 crore for 201415, a sevenfold increase over the previous year when it had closed with R51 crore. According to the documents filed with the Registrar of Companies by Ola parent ANI Technologies, the company had a net worth of R3,486 crore in March 2015. No details on profits or losses were disclosed.

Ola, which is backed by marquee global investors like Helion Ventures, Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital, Accel and Matrix Partners, among others, has raised close to $1.2 billion since its inception in 2011 predominantly through convertible preference shares. As of March 2015, the founders held about 90% of the equity with Bhavish Agarwal holding 62% and Ankit Bhati 28.5%. In FY14, the company had reported a net loss of R34 crore against revenues of R51 crore. In FY13, the net loss was R22 crore, while revenues were R16 crore.

Intensifying competition thanks to the rapid rise of Uber forced Ola to scale up operations and it doubled its driver partners on the platform, spreading to 102 cities.

Uber operates in 26 cities in India. According to Anil Kumar, the CEO of consulting fir m RedSeer Consulting, Ola has the edge with a 65% share of the taxi market. “Till last month we could see Uber catching up fast with Ola. But with the master stroke around Ola Micro, they've been able to reverse the trend and win back share,” he said.

Currently, 80% of the bookings come from Ola Mini and Micro.

Ola, which raised its last round of funding in November 2015, is looking to raise additional funds for expansion. This comes at a time when Uber, which raised $3.5 billion recently, has committed a substantial portion for India operations. Uber has about 2.6 lakh vehicles on its platform.

On Monday, Chinese cab-hailing app Didi Chuxing, which is also an investor in Ola, had said it received an investment of about $600 million from China Life Insurance, boosting resources to fund its battle with Uber. That was just a month after Uber raised $1 billion from Apple.

Through its subsidiary company Ola Fleet Technology, the company has partnered with automakers to lend cars to its drivers. According to RedSeer Consulting, Ola has gained significant market share with the launch of Ola Micro, which operates hatchback cars. The company, which has about 3.5 lakh cabs and 1 lakh autos on its platform, is looking to double the cabs on its platform by end of this fiscal. Both Ola and Uber have been burning significant cash over the past year with ride-linked incentives to drivers in a bid to capture the market and attract more drivers to the platform.