Funding story
Transport aggregators seem to enjoying a massive boom these days. After the gains accrued by taxi and 2-wheeler aggregators, it is now the turn of bus aggregators to notch up gains. Gurgaon-based bus aggregator Shuttl, which operates in the NCR area, recently succeeded in raising $20 million in series A funding. The funding was led by Lightspeed Ventures, Times Internet and Sequoia Capital. Seqouia is one of Shuttl’s existing investors.
About Shuttl
The startup was founded in April 2015 by Amit Singh and Deepanshu Malviya. The raised funding is expected to be used for a variety of purposes-general expansion, aggressive marketing and the use of better technology to facilitate more effective aggregation. According to Amit, Shuttl was the result of a realization of how incomplete Delhi’s public transportation systems were. Using public transportation would be a hassle-laden process, but Shuttl has worked hard to change this. The startup seeks to solve the problems of the daily commuter by giving him an assured mode of transportation which is reliable, cheap and effective. Availing of Shuttl’s services is a very easy process-it merely involves getting one’s account registered, selecting boarding and drop points, the time of commencement of the journey, before picking up the riding pass. The enterprise’s system is geared towards maximum transparency.
Currently, 15 routes which are most used by commuters in Gurgaon and the NCR area are being offered on the startup’s excellent platform.
About 15,000 rides a day are currently being offered, and Shuttl seeks to breach the 50,000 target within the next 6 months. The services are not very costly, and their main customer base is the urban middle-class commuter. Ticket price normally ranges between Rs. 20 and Rs. 100.
Conclusion
Shuttl’s principal competitors in this segment include the likes of Cityflo, rBus and ZipGo. However, Shuttl’s has raised a much higher amount of funding than its competitors-something which is likely to allow it to grab a big share of the public transportation pie in the NCR region and beyond.
The Android app can be downloaded here. The website also provides additional info about the venture.
