Mumbai Angels- and YourNest-backed BookMyCab acquires CabonClick in Hyderabad

Mumbai-based LiveMinds Solutions Pvt Ltd, the company behind the online cab booking service BookMyCab.com, has acquired CabonClick.com, another online cab booking venture focused on Hyderabad and surrounding areas, from ASPM Mobility Ventures Pvt Ltd. The transaction details remain undisclosed.

Post acquisition, BookMyCab will integrate its fleet with that of CabonClick and roll out its call taxi services in Hyderabad.

BookMyCab was set up in 2012 by a team of four IIT Mumbai alumni – Raviraj Jain, Avinash Gupta, Anuja Gupta and Jaysingrao Nimbalakar. The platform allows users to hire cabs via its mobile app, website or through a 24-hour dedicated call centre. The firm recently expanded its services to Kolkata and claims to have witnessed a 200 per cent growth in driver registrations. Its services are also available in Delhi-NCR, Chennai, Bangalore and Pune.

The firm claims to have 95 per cent market share in Mumbai's non-A/C cab segment. In July 2012, the firm had raised an undisclosed amount in its first round of funding from early-stage investor YourNest Angel Fund with participation from Mumbai Angels.

"This M&A is a part of our overall strategy to roll out BookMyCab across the country in 2014-15. We are confident that consolidation is the way to grow strategically in the e-com space in India. We chose Hyderabad as the first market to enter southern India due to the fantastic response during our test phase," said Avinash Gupta, CEO of BookMyCab.com.

Founded in August 2012 by Prateek Mahesh and Abhishek Singh, CabonClick is an online aggregator for cabs and car rental inventory. Its services include local hire, outstation and multi-city car hire and rentals, premium car rentals and corporate packages.

"They (BookMyCab) are leaders in this segment and their expertise and experience across metros in India will offer a brilliant experience to subscribers of Hyderabad," said Mahesh.

Online cab aggregators have been quickly making a space for themselves in the urban transportation business. The big players in that space include Olacabs, which has pulled in $210 million in a new funding round led by SoftBank besides TaxiForSure and Savaari in the VC funded basket.

Global player Uber is also fast expanding and has recently added its low-cost service. These aggregators also compete with fleet owning ventures Meru and EasyCabs among others.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)