Self-drive car rental startup Revv raises $9 million

PrimeMover Mobility Technologies, a Gurugram based startup, which owns and operates self-drive car rental platform Revv, has raised $9 million in equity and debt financing.

According to an official statement released by the company, the proceeds from Series A round will be used for launching its services in fresh markets , develop new products, and to come up with proprietary technology to enhance customer experience.

The financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed, but it follows the Rs 160 crore raised by bigger rival Zoomcar in a round led by Ford Smart Mobility, a subsidiary of Ford Motor Company, earlier in August.

"The number of people giving up traditional assownership is set to grow exponentially. The rise of taxi-hailing apps has been an important market-creator, weaning people away from traditional car ownership. The key would be to address the highly varied needs of a shared-mobility user, through a suite of products tailored for each need," Anupam Agarwal, co-founder, Revv said in a statement.

According to the press release, a major amount used for developing technological capabilities on two-sided sharing platforms, predictive inventory management, dynamic pricing and driver behaviour monitoring.

The funding round is a mix of equity and debt funding, the latter from financing partners such as Mahindra & Mahindra Financial Services; and vehicle leasing from LeasePlan India.

"We believe that Revv's approach to creating use-case based products will meet customers' needs without compromising the convenience and flexibility of owning the vehicle, while allowing for better utilization of assets on the supply side," said Pranav Parikh, managing partner, Edelweiss Private Equity.

Revv is currently present in four cities across the country - Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chandigarh.