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Cab-aggregator Ola, which acquired Taxi For Sure last year, has shut down the TFS business while also laying off 700 employees. 
 It was last year that Ola had acquired its Bengaluru-based rival <keyword id="1428790" type="COMPANY" weightage="100" keywordseo="TaxiforSure">TaxiForSure</keyword> for $200 million in order to take a lead over <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Ubers-now-got-a-huge-ace-up-its-sleeve-in-India-with-Didi-Chuxing-on-board/articleshow/53507096.cms">arch rival Uber</a>. Ever since then, Ola has been shutting down TaxiForSure as an independent brand across various cities, by integrating cabs offered on TFS to its own app. 
 
Also read: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Delhi-to-set-ceilings-for-Uber-and-Ola/articleshow/53648325.cms">Delhi to cap tariffs for Uber and Ola</a> 
 
"Since the acquisition, Ola has been unclear about the brand positioning of TaxiForSure," a top executive at the company told <a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/ola-lays-off-700-employees-shuts-down-taxiforsure-business/articleshow/53730971.cms">ET</a>. "Silently, the TaxiForSure fleet was transferred to Ola supply and even incentives were more lucrative for Ola vs TaxiForSure," this person added. 
 
With the layoffs, Ola would save close to Rs30 crore per month, said an investor. 
 
Also read: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Ola-has-done-something-which-will-make-it-way-ahead-of-Uber-Find-out/articleshow/53488024.cms">Ola has done something which will make it way ahead of Uber. Find out </a> 
 
Ola, backed by SoftBank, is finding ways to reduce its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Ola-spends-heavily-to-maintain-lead-ends-up-in-losses/articleshow/52880765.cms">cash burn rate</a>, getting prepared for the intense battle with Uber that lies in the near future. 
 
<a href="http://www.tanay.co.in/sites/default/files/tfns.png">Image source</a>

Taxi ‘not’ for sure: Ola shuts down TFS, lays off 700 employees

Didi Kuaidi, China's largest taxi aggregator app, which is backed by internet behemoth Alibaba, would soon invest in homegrown Ola, thus making the <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword> vs Ola battle bloodier than before. 

	Didi's investment in Bangalore-headquartered Ola comes close on the heels of it picking up stakes in San Francisco-based Lyft and Malaysia's GrabTaxi, signalling a global alliance against the cashrich Uber.
 People close to the development told TOI that Ola, formerly Olacabs, is finalizing the second tranche of $200 million of its $500 million financing round led by GIC, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund, Didi Kuaidi, and <keyword id="2649768" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Baillie-Gifford">Baillie Gifford</keyword>, a Scottish investment firm which is a shareholder in Flipkart, valuing the Indian cab-hailing app at $5 billion. 

	GIC, which put in a small amount when Ola scored $400 million led by DST Global earlier this year, is expected to pump as much as $100 million this time around while Didi mayinvest around $30 million. Russian billionaire Yuri Milner's DST Global is also likely to participate in the latest round, sources said. TOI had reported first, in its August 10 edition, about New York-based hedge fund FalconEdge, Softbank Corp and Tiger Global putting the first chunk of $300 million into Ola. Separate email queries sent by TOI regarding the financing round to Bhavish Aggarwal, co-founder &amp; CEO of Ola, Didi Kuaidi and GIC did not elicit a response till the time of going to press. A spokesperson for Baillie Gifford said, "I am afraid that on this occasion we will not be able to offer any comment."
 

	"There's a lot of interest in this round and it may even get oversubscribed. As of now it's likely to close at $500 million.Things are still to be worked out fully," said a person privy to the matter. Even as Ola builds a bigger war chest, there has been talk of the Travis Ka lanick-led Uber looking to raise $1billion for India separately, just like it racked up $1.2 billion for China recently , two markets which are of enormous significance for the company . Uber, the most-valued tech startup worldwide at $51billion, also became the youngest privately-held company to cross the $50 billion valuation mark, beating Facebook's record in July this year.
 Despite being buffeted by regulatory hurdles, both Ola and Uber have been aggressively rolling out new services, discounting, announcing millions in investments along with introducing driver initiatives as competition to corner market share intensifies in Asia's third largest economy which has seen smartpho ne usage grow exponentially .The five-year-old Ola, which came to life in Mumbai, presently leads the domestic taxi app market and claims to be doing as many as 750,000 rides a day while Uber, while announcing its $1 billion investment plan for India, said that it aims to touch 1million rides over the next 9 months from the present 200,000. Ola's pole position got cemented earlier this year when it acquired its smaller rival TaxiForSure . A month before Ola acqui red TFS in India, China's largest taxi-hailing app <keyword id="2677023" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Didi-Dache">Didi Dache</keyword> merged with its closest competitor Kuaidi Dache, backed by internet conglomerate Tencent Holdings and in vestors like Alibaba, SoftBank and Tiger Global, to form a $6-billion transportation powerhouse. Didi Kuaidi is valued at $16 billion and is Uber's biggest competitor worldwide, having raised $4.4 billion in investor money. The Chinese taxi app has been aligning all of Uber's rivals to fight the startup which is spread across 300 cities globally. 
	 
	(Image credits: Indiatimes)

Ola-Didi Kuaidi to take on Uber together

Cab aggregator <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword> posted a consolidated loss of over Rs 2,311 crore -- about Rs 6 crore a day -- during fiscal 2015-16, on account of heavy advertising and promotional expenses and high employee cost, as per a news report by PTI.The Bengaluru-based firm, which is locked in an intense battle for leadership with US-based Uber, has seen its losses widen about three times from Rs 796.11 crore in 2014-15, Ola said in a filing with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs.<keyword id="2200842" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="ANI-Technologies">ANI Technologies</keyword> -- which runs Ola -- did see its revenues registering a stellar growth at Rs 758.23 crore during 2015-16 compared to Rs 103.77 crore in the previous fiscal.Emails by PTI sent to Ola remained unanswered.<keyword id="2385099" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Anchal-Agarwal">Anchal Agarwal</keyword>, co-founder of research and analytics firm <keyword id="4159482" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Tofler">Tofler</keyword> said while the absolute amount of losses have indeed widened, the loss margin has "reduced considerably"."They spent almost Rs 8.5 for every rupee earned in 2014 -15. That number is down to almost Rs 4 for every rupee earned for 2015-16. With the pull-back in incentives etc in recent months, it's possible this has now dropped to levels at par with e-commerce companies that spend roughly Rs 2-3 for every rupee earned," she added.The consolidated numbers include financials of ANI Technologies, Ola Fleet Technologies (leasing business), <keyword id="1062211" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Serendipity-Infolabs">Serendipity Infolabs</keyword> (Taxi For Sure) and Zipcash Card Service (46 per cent ownership).In August 2016, Ola shut down the TaxiForSure (TFS) business, about 18 months after acquiring the rival for USD 200 million.As per the filing, Ola's losses were widened on account of employee related expenses rising over five-fold to Rs 461.60 crore in the said fiscal from Rs 85.16 crore in 2014- 15. Similarly, Ola expanded its advertising and promotional expenditure to over Rs 437.89 crore in 2015-16 from Rs 99.84 crore in the previous year.Both Ola and Uber have loosened their purse strings to bring more riders and driver partners on board, offering them discounted rides and incentives, in a bid to wrest control of the lucrative Indian market.Over the last few years, the explosion of smartphones in India the world s second largest telecom market in terms of subscriber base has made it more convenient for consumers to book a cab on the go through apps and secure payment options.Companies like Ola and Uber have made booking a taxi ride as easy as a couple of quick taps on the phone screen.Since ANI Technologies is not a publicly-traded company, it is not obligated to disclose quarterly performance. It has raised investments of over USD 1.5 billion from investors, including <keyword id="163404" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Softbank">SoftBank</keyword> Group, Tiger Global, Matrix Partners, Steadview Capital, <keyword id="270604" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sequoia">Sequoia</keyword> India, Accel Partners US and Falcon Edge.In November, Ola raised about USD 250 million from SoftBank, albeit at a lower valuation of USD 3 billion (compared to USD 4.5 billion earlier). The company's Board has recently approved a proposal to raise another USD 100 million from investors, which it said would be "primarily to fund its expansion plans".Ola, which has a presence in 110 Indian cities compared to Uber's operations in 29 cities, has been aggressively expanding its portfolio of services. It has a number of offerings like Micro (affordable), Mini, Prime (sedan), Lux (luxury), Outstation, Share (shared rides), Auto, Rentals, Shuttle (buses) and e-rickshaw. Ola, which claims to have over 6,00,000 vehicles across cabs, auto-rickshaws and taxis, is also placing big bets on new technologies like electric vehicles to stay ahead of competition

Bleeding bad: Ola roughly spent Rs 4 for every rupee earned during 2015-16

New York-based hedge fund <keyword id="60126" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="80" keywordseo="Falcon">Falcon</keyword> Edge and <keyword id="6357722" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="silicon-valley">Silicon Valley</keyword> venture fund <keyword id="144381" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Accel-Partners">Accel Partners</keyword> are expected to join DST Global which is leading a soon-to-be-announced $400-million financing round in taxi hailing service <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword>, sources close to the matter told TOI. 
 Falcon Edge is expected to pump in around $20 million in the new round while <keyword id="2788417" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Accel-US">Accel US</keyword> will put $5 million, sources said. Accel US was an investor in TaxiForSure (TFS) and became an Ola shareholder post its recent acquisition. Ola's other existing investors -including Tiger Global, Matrix Partners, <keyword id="6497288" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Steadview-Capital">Steadview Capital</keyword> --are also participating in the new financing round. 
 
 The latest fund-raise is likely to value the company at $2.5 billion post the investment, as reported by this newspaper first in its February 26 edition. Russian billionaire <keyword id="303107" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Yuri-Milner">Yuri Milner</keyword>'s DST, a significant investor in e-commerce biggie Flipkart, is expected to hold just under 10 per cent stake in the four-year-old company , post the new round. 
 
 When contacted by TOI, Bhavish Agarwal, co-founder, Ola, did not offer any comments, while Falcon Edge could not be reached immediately for a response. Founded by <keyword id="2566840" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Richard-Gerson">Richard Gerson</keyword> together with <keyword id="2788418" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Navroz-D-Udwadia">Navroz D Udwadia</keyword> and James Minshull, Falcon Edge leads the pack of a new breed of <keyword id="42111" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Wall-Street">Wall Street</keyword> hedge funds, a Tiger Global offshoot, managing more than $4 billion in assets. Its India <keyword id="6362476" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="80" keywordseo="investments">investments</keyword> include realty portal <keyword id="35061" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="80" keywordseo="housing">Housing</keyword> and <keyword id="2112984" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Newshunt">NewsHunt</keyword>, a mobile news aggregation service. 
 
 
Hedge funds like Falcon Edge, Valiant Capital and Steadview Capital, among others, funneled big money into Indian consumer internet companies last year, fanning the already frothy valuations of these tech startups. 
 The latest round of fundraise for Ola, founded by IITBombay batchmates Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati in 2011, would put it right up in <keyword id="819204" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="the-League">the league</keyword> of the most valuable internet firms domestically .Ola's $210-million fund-raise led by <keyword id="163404" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Softbank">SoftBank</keyword> in October last year valued it at $650 million -post-money -making the Japanese investor the startup's largest investor. 
 
The cab aggregator is present across 67 cities and has received $277 million of capital across five financing rounds. Its biggest competitor taxi-hailing app Uber had stepped on the gas in India by doling out huge discounts to riders. However, its growth has stalled considerably post the rape of a female passenger by one of its drivers last year in Delhi.

Ola Cabs to receive $400mn funding soon

Very recently, I had a not-so-pleasant <keyword id="6354720" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Ola">Ola</keyword> experience while travelling from Noida to Gurgaon for an official meeting. On booking a mini, a pop-up box told me my request was being upgraded to a Sedan, but I’d have to pay mini charges. I was happy. Maybe Ola was honoring me for being a dedicated user of its taxi services. Not bad at all, I thought to myself. But as I headed towards the cab, the happiness started to fade away. I saw a dust-laden Indica parked at a distance with its paint coming off from everywhere. The number plate read the same as on my Ola app. As I sat inside it, I found out that the state of the car was worse. There was a moist unpleasant smell coming from the dirty white cotton seat covers. Dried pan stains on the footmats disgusted me. Open wires dangling from the dashboard was an ugly sight. Updated to a Sedan? I thought it was worse, ridiculous than a mini! With not too much time in hand, I decided to take the ride. 
 However, such and many other problems are regularly faced by people like us who opt for <keyword id="3163199" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="taxi-booking-apps">taxi booking apps</keyword> for commuting on a regular basis. It’s a shame that in India, these companies have enough demand, but such poor services. A look at a few of such complaints will make you never want to use these cabs at all. 
 For instance, 27-year-old Shobhit, a resident of Gurgaon, booked a <keyword id="1428790" type="COMPANY" weightage="100" keywordseo="TaxiforSure">TaxiForSure</keyword> cab to travel to IGI airport. “It took me half an hour to explain to him where I stay because location accuracy is big issue with the app. When I sat in the cab, he told me I had cancelled the trip. I was shocked because I hadn’t. He said he couldn’t take me till I booked it again. So I had to cancel the ride only to find the app showing no cabs. I struggled for 10 minutes, but it was of no use. The driver refused to take me and I could not find any other cabs in the vicinity. I ultimately missed my flight. It’s name should be TaxiNotSure,” he says, adding that he wrote a stinker mail to the company, but never got a reply. 
 
In another encounter, Tokas Jain, who works as sales professional in GSK, was on an official Kolkata trip. “I had booked a cab in Kolkata and it never reached me. It picked up some other passenger with my booking and the same was billed to me. Fortunately, I use cash for making payments. Had there been balance in my wallet, I wonder whether they would have ever refunded the money,” he says. 
 Deepti Purohit, a journalist based out of Noida, had not even booked a cab, she had merely installed Ola on her phone. A day later, she found a bill in her mailbox that said she had taken a trip and had an unbilled amount of nearly Rs 400 to bear. Dumbfounded, she wrote a mail to the company, who later apologized to her for the mistake.<keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword> had one of its users Aditya Samod fuming with anger when money was debited thrice from his wallet without any reason, “I added Rs 500 by Paytm. I booked taxis thrice, but none of the drivers come. They either did not answer the call or refused to come. But every time I cancelled a ride, Uber charged me Rs 150. I wrote to them, but have only been assured assistance so far,” he says. 
 
Kaamna, a PR executive, who often uses these apps, made a significant observation: “Drivers take a longer route deliberately that results in inflated bills. I boarded a cab from Barakhamba to Gurgaon and he intentionally took a long deserted route. Despite telling him to take the shorter route, he refused. I called up TFS helpline number. They put me on hold for more than 10 minutes. I was all alone yelling at the driver and it was evening time. There was no response from customer care. Till now, I have not received even a single call from their side to know if I am safe,” she says. “And the drivers are talking on the phone all the time!,” she complains. 
 
Aakanksha Jain, a journalist, said one of these days she had booked TaxiForSure cab. “On reaching the destination, I never got the bill on my app. I asked the driver and he said it was Rs 265. I paid him. But later, I was shocked to find out that the actual bill was Rs 172,” she says. She also highlights how Ola autos are merely an addition to the Ola app, but absolutely inefficient in practice. “I got off the metro to book an auto since the app showed options just 2 minutes away. For the next ten minutes, I stood there as the app scanned the options, but none of the auto drivers accepted the booking. Finally, I had to take an auto from nearby,” she says. 
 
Personally, I felt it was bizarre when the Indica car’s shabby Ola driver said to me “please rate me 5 star, madam” with a wide grin as he dropped me off. After paying him the money, I went back to the app to give him 1 rating, and was shocked to see that he already had an overall rating of 4.5! He perhaps requests each traveler to extend the favour. Moreover, I am surprised why Ola allowed such a car to be in its list! <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/searchresult.cms?query=uber">Uber</a>, TaxiForSure and the likes. It’s time you do something about it! 
 
(Image credits: BCCL)

Where Taxi Hailing Apps in
India are going terribly wrong!

India now has over 462 million internet users – second largest in the world after China which means two-thirds of the 1.3 billion population have yet to come online. Only about 10 percent are currently shopping on <keyword id="436047" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ecommerce">eCommerce</keyword> sites which means that the story has just started for India where there is only room to expand. 2016 had been a challenging year for the e-tailing sector, with multiple regulatory challenges and slow demand growth that have been carried over to this year. This limited growth seen in the industry, has ensured that the murmurs around consolidation continue growing. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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 The biggest movement in the sector has been the recent <keyword id="6354742" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Flipkart">Flipkart</keyword> funding and Flipkart will use the capital from Tencent, eBay Inc and Microsoft to grow PhonePe- it’s UPI based app,and expand its portfolio of private labels and relaunch key categories such as furniture and grocery. The company’s plans to turn profitable in specific categories comes at a time when <keyword id="6354743" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Amazon-India">Amazon India</keyword>’s is equipped with $5-billion funding, and the upcoming threat of <keyword id="302749" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Alibaba">Alibaba</keyword>’s entry alongside learning from Paytm Mall. <keyword id="541988" type="COMPANY" weightage="80" keywordseo="SnapDeal">Snapdeal</keyword>, which is one of the companies most impacted by the industry slowdown in the last year, is reportedly likely to be acquired by Flipkart and as the rumors grow, we wondered how the e-commerce battleground would look like if this deal goes through. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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 What will happen if the biggest consolidation in the eCommerce sector goes through. Benefits of the Snapdeal acquisition for Flipkart • Access to Snapdeal’s well-oiled supply chain network - This deal gives Flipkart a way to expand its supply chain reach quickly and inorganically by getting access to Snapdeal’s numerous small and big warehouses, especially in Northern India which is Snapdeal’s territory. Fast deliveries and regional fulfilment of orders have become crucial for e-tailers to achieve both higher customer satisfaction and lower supply chain costs. And this move by Flipkart would be a significant boost in its quest for supply chain leadership over <keyword id="18635" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Amazon">Amazon</keyword>, which is aggressively expanding its supply chain network. • Access to another large investor- With Softbank expected to buy into Flipkart with this deal, this should give Flipkart additional funding firepower to sustain its bruising battle with Amazon for a longer period which will ensure that the new Flipkart group becomes a more serious contender for Amazon. • Expansion of Flipkart’s customer base- While admittedly there is a significant overlap between Flipkart and Snapdeal customer bases, there is a small set of Snapdeal customers from Northern India who can be added to Flipkart’s kitty with this deal ensuring more customers than ever before and maybe even more GMV compared to Amazon after the deal. • Increase in exclusives portfolio- This deal would mean that Flipkart can take advantage of Snapdeal’s many exclusive tie-ups with brands globally, which should especially help it in home and fashion categories portfolio diversification 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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 Commenting on challenges and way ahead for Flipkart from the deal, Anil Kumar, CEO, <keyword id="3631351" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="RedSeer-Consulting">RedSeer Consulting</keyword> said, “Extracting synergies and value from this acquisition would be a challenging task for Flipkart, considering the physical distances, differing strategies and the different team cultures at both companies. However, if the post-merger integration is executed successfully, the deal could play out similar to Ola/TFS acquisition in online cabs space, which gave Ola significant funding and capability firepower to hold off <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="40" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword> in India. Something which would help Flipkart fend off Amazon for much longer”

You Searched For "ola tfs" and got 6 results

Taxi ‘not’ for sure: Ola shuts down TFS, lays off 700 employees

BI India Bureau

Ola-Didi Kuaidi to take on Uber together

BI India Bureau

Bleeding bad: Ola roughly spent Rs 4 for every rupee earned during 2015-16

BI India Bureau

Ola Cabs to receive $400mn funding soon

BI India Bureau

Where Taxi Hailing Apps in India are going terribly wrong!

Anushree Singh

This is what will happen if Snapdeal gets acquired by Flipkart

Tanya Dubey

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