Denis Opudo
Many companies are investing in the ride-sharing sector. However, companies that are already commanding the market work to improve their services. This makes them offer stiff competition to their competitors and stand a chance of having more customers. It forces various companies to work more smatter than their competitors. That is the only way of making the intended profit.
Careem is a ride-sharing company based in Dubai that was founded in 2012 and it has a customer base of 12 million customers. The customers are found in 90 cities in Turkey, Lebanon, Egypt, Pakistan, and Jordan. Others are also found in Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Pakistan. Moreover, the company raised $350 million from investors in December 2016. Saudi Telecom and Rakuten gave $1 billion valuations to the company. The two are e-commerce companies come from Japan. Moreover, the company got $62 million investment from Kingdom Holding. Kingdom Holding is an investment company of Prince Alwaleed bin Talal a Saudi businessman. Kingdom holding also bought shares worth 7.1% from Careem in June 2017.
Careem has acquired RoundMenu according to its CEO. RoundMenu is a food ordering and restaurant listing company. It works across the Arab nations. The purchase is a move to strengthen Careems plans to invest in food delivery category. The purchase will also help the company compete with Uber Eats. Uber Eats is an initiative of Uber Company. The platform operates in Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt. Furthermore, the three are the largest markets found in the North Africa and the Middle East.
RoundMenu operates in 18 cities across nine countries. Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt are among the nine countries. HoneyBee Tech Ventures were the original founders. However, it got extra support from Middle East Venture partners and Horeca Trade. It was also supported by and Beco Capital. The support helps it to raise $3.1 million. Careem will test RoundMenu’s delivery capability in February 2018.
Careem also purchased a minority share in Swvl in July 2017. SWvl is an Egyptian based startup that allows passengers to reserve seats on busses. The passenger then makes payments through the company’s mobile app. Furthermore, the company is looking forward to expanding into new markets in East Africa in 2018.
