BluSmart, an EV ride hailing firm with roots in the capital of India-Delhi, has raised $25Mn in a Series A funding round led by BP Ventures during a never seen before high in the country’s EV sector.
The round also saw participation from Mayfield India Fund, 9Unicorns, and Survam Partners, alongside other existing investors.
The company plans to use these funds to expand its fleet of electric vehicles and charging stations to five additional Indian cities in the next two years, growing out of its base of operations in Delhi.
BluSmart is a ride hailing service much like Ola and Uber, with the added bonus of using an entire fleet of electric vehicles. It is India’s first and largest integrated EV ride-hailing and charging company, and aims to deliver safer, cleaner and more sustainable mobility.
There are a few other key differences that might help BluSmart get ahead of its competition-most important of them being no surge pricing. Moreover, drivers will also not be able to reject rides. While this may give off the idea that the ride hailing service is a little harsh on its partnering drivers, it also has their welfare in mind, allowing them to reduce the financial burden of vehicle ownership by leasing vehicles to drivers and oversees all vehicle maintenance.
India’s EV market is growing quite rapidly, a fact that is proved by the exceptional performance of Ola Electric and its latest scooters. The company, which is now worth $3Bn, sold scooters worth $150 million in just two days, and claimed to sell four scooters every second in the first 24 hours. Thus, at a time when India’s love for the EV market is already at an all time high, companies like BluSmart, which offer smart additions to solutions that are already quite popular, have a real chance of making substantial headway.
Anmol Singh Jaggi, co-founder of BluSmart said “We believe that electric mobility has huge growth potential, driven in part by the increasingly favourable economics behind electric vehicles. With that in mind we want to redefine ride-hailing with electric vehicles, and our consumer focus has helped us to already establish a strong brand presence in our core market; to date our vehicles have travelled over 21 million kilometres. This latest funding infusion will help us grow as we work with bp to help transform India’s high polluting cities and redefine ride-hailing with electric vehicles.”
