SOCAR, a south Korean car-sharing startup, has filed for an preliminary public providing, introduced on Wednesday by Korea Trade. The small print – the variety of shares to be provided within the IPO and the value vary – haven’t but been decided, stated a spokesperson at SOCAR.
SOCAR has reached roughly $834 billion (1 trillion gained) valuation after elevating $50.7 million (60 billion gained) in October 2020. The corporate has raised a complete of about $275 million since its inception in 2011, the corporate spokesperson confirmed. In accordance with media stories, SOCAR’s estimated valuation is to be $2.5 billion (3 trillion gained) after the itemizing within the first half of this yr.
Its earlier traders embrace SK Holdings, Bain Capital, Premier Companions, SoftBank Ventures Asia, Altos Ventures, KB Funding, Stonebridge Ventures, LB Non-public Fairness, SG Non-public Fairness, and extra.
The corporate plans to launch a transportation tremendous app this yr that may present all-in-one mobility providers like car-sharing, electrical bike-sharing, car parking zone search, car-hailing, prepare reservation and extra, Jaewook Park, CEO of SOCAR, stated in early December in the course of the firm’s press convention. Park additionally stated SOCAR would change a fleet of its automobiles with zero-emission, together with electrical or hydrogen-powered automobiles, by 2030 and strengthen its autonomous automobiles enterprise.
SOCAR will speed up to make further acquisitions and advance its expertise with the IPO proceeds, Park stated. The corporate already accomplished two acquisitions final month – South Korean on-line parking platform Modu Firm and electrical bike rental platform Elecle. SOCAR additionally invested in autonomous driving startup RideFlux in 2018.
The 11-year-old agency began the car-sharing service with 100 rental automobiles in Jeju in 2011 and launched its cell app in 2012. SOCAR acquired VCNC, a Korean cell messaging app platform, in 2018 to function a van-hailing service Tada. (The startup, nonetheless, needed to stop its van-hailing service in 2020 due to South Korea’s revised regulation that restricts ride-hailing to solely licensed taxis and limits rental automotive providers from providing drivers, apart from vans with 11 to fifteen seats.) Final October, SOCAR has bought a 60% stake within the ride-hailing arm to Viva Republica, the Seoul-based fintech firm behind Toss.
In 2018, SOCAR arrange a Malaysia-based subsidiary SOCAR Malaysia, which has raised a complete of $73.2 million thus far.
The competitors of the mobility platform business in South Korea has intensified as native car-hailing firms corresponding to Kakao Mobility and TMAP Mobility actively develop their enterprise within the nation with ambitions to develop into the mobility tremendous app. In October, Uber Applied sciences additionally joined the race by forming a three way partnership firm with TMAP Mobility, owned by Korean telco large SK Telecom, to supply ride-hailing service in South Korea.
Kakao Mobility reportedly plans to go public in two years whereas TMAP Mobility goals to checklist by 2025.
The corporate spokesperson famous that its car-sharing friends additionally embrace Zipcar, Turo, and getaround.
