UAE-based car rental service Udrive raised $1.3 million in just 48 hours through crowdfunding platform Eureeca.
The pay-per-minute service attracted 186 investors as part of its Series A found of funding, which included customers, institutional and everyday investors.
Hasib Khan, Udrive CEO and founder, said: “In October, we decided that now was the time to continue our Series A funding round with Eureeca, a plan that originated in January 2020. As a regulated funding vehicle, Eureeca was able to give investors, many of whom are our customers, greater levels of confidence in investing in our business. Thanks to this funding, the future of the company looks incredibly positive.”
Hasib Khan, Udrive CEO and founder.
Udrive, which was founded in in the UAE in 2017, currently has around 180,000 registered users across Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, and Ajman. The company recently served their millionth trip, with user growth expected to double in 2021 as new users increased by 20 percent in the last six months.
Funding is expected to boost the fleet of cars in the UAE while also paving the way for expansion into Saudi Arabia and Turkey as part of the company’s drive back into growth mode.
Sam Quawasmi, co-CEO and co-founder of Eureeca, said: “We’re delighted Udrive has been able to reach the target initially set out on Eureeca.com, which forms part of the company’s Series A funding strategy, in such a short period of time. Udrive has now gone into overfunding and is still open to investors keen to own a share in the company.”
The latest success for the equity crowdfunding platform follows recent announcements which have seen funding of $1.2 million and $2.4m for UK-based companies Teysha Technologies and the multi-award-winning electricity storage company Storelectric, respectively.
Sam Quawasmi, co-CEO and co-founder of Eureeca.
In the UAE, Eureeca facilitated the funding of $817,000 for Fruitful Day, the office and home fruit delivery service as well as close to $2 million for Enerwhere, a Dubai-based DEWA-certified solar utility company.
“Despite the challenges of Covid-19, Eureeca continued to successfully fund companies from the UAE, Malaysia, UK and Holland in the midst of the crisis, underscoring Eureeca, and the business model as recession proof.
As a result of our success, we have seen a 400 percent increase in applications, including larger businesses looking to raise seven-figure raises, which is subsequently piquing the interest of institutional investors,” added Quawasmi.
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