Ola Electric Mobility, the India-based electric vehicle (EV)-focused spinout of ride hailing service Ola, has extended its series A round after securing an undisclosed sized investment from Ratan Tata, chairman of conglomerate Tata Group, YourStory reported on Monday.
Hedge fund manager Tiger Global and venture capital firm Matrix Partners India both took part in the round’s $56m first tranche in March 2019, alongside unnamed additional investors.
The spinoff was founded last month and will concentrate on the overall EV ecosystem, in areas such as advanced batteries, charging and battery-swapping stations and other EV infrastructure.
Ola itself operates a mobile app that enables users to book journeys with private drivers or taxis. It has also developed its own mobile payment service and a credit platform, before moving into food deliveries with the 2017 acquisition of online food ordering platform Foodpanda.
Ola Electric Mobility is pursuing its activities as part of Mission: Electric, an initiative Ola announced in April 2018 that would involve it adding 10,000 EVs to its ride hailing platform over the course of a year.
Tata, who was also an early investor in Ola, said: “The electric vehicle ecosystem is evolving dramatically every day, and I believe Ola Electric will play a key role in its growth and development.
I have always admired the vision of (Ola founder and CEO) Bhavish Aggarwal and I am confident that this will be part of yet another important strategic move into this new business area.”