Cab aggregator Ola is looking at raising up to $100 million in fresh funding from existing shareholders to take American rival Uber head-on.
The board of the Bengaluru-based company has approved a proposal on the same in a recent meeting.
Both Ola and Uber have made multi-million dollar investments in their operations in India, to ramp up the number of vehicles on their platform and get new riders on board.
The board approved the proposal to offer convertible securities at ₹13,521 apiece through a rights issue at its meeting on March 22, 2017.
In a regulatory filing, ANI Technologies — which operates Ola — said its board has approved raising “up to $100 million (about ₹670 crore) by issue of 495,526 Series ‘l1’ preference shares of face value ₹10 each at a price-per-subscription share equivalent to ₹13,521.”
The filing, made to the Corporate Affairs Ministry under the Companies Act, added that the rights issue was scheduled for March 23.
However, it could not be immediately ascertained how much the company raised through the issue. A query sent to Ola did not elicit any response.
The filing said the objective of the issue was “to meet the growth and expansion of business and strengthen the financial position of the company.”
Ola had recently raised about ₹1,675 crore from its Japanese investor SoftBank.
The company, which has a presence in 110 Indian cities, has been aggressively expanding its portfolio of services. It is placing big bets on new technologies such as electric vehicles to stay ahead of the competition.
Uber, which operates in 29 Indian cities, has made the country one of its top priorities.
After selling its China business to rival Didi, the company has sharpened its focus on strengthening its platform and expanding driver-partner ecosystem in India.