Indian startup Zypp Electric plans to use new investments from Japanese oil and energy conglomerate ENEOS to bring its EV rental service to Southeast Asia early next year, JS has exclusively learned.
The company wants to be active in fifteen markets over the next two years. Of those 15 markets, Zypp Electric plans to launch its pilot in at least one Southeast Asian market early next year, co-founder and CEO Akash Gupta told JS in an exclusive interview. The latest funding, which amounted to $15 million and is led by ENEOS, is part of Zypp Electric's Series C round, which will cost Gupta projects between $35 million and $40 million and will be completed within six to eight weeks .
Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines are potential markets for Zypp Electric. All these countries are focused on two-wheelers and handle a lot of deliveries, the co-founder said, adding that Indonesia will be the first market to start with.
“There are different ways in which we think and discuss this [Southeast Asia launch plan] with a few players. We will explain that in the next two to three quarters,” said Gupta.
He also said the startup is in early talks to enter the Middle East as part of its global expansion. However, the exact details of the Middle East launch have not been revealed.
The Gurugram-based startup, which currently operates in major Indian cities Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Hyderabad, offers an EV-as-a-service platform targeting e-commerce companies and gig workers. The platform includes an app and associated software that provides data and analytics for fleet and delivery management, as well as a fleet of electric two-wheelers. Gig economy workers, who can rent the e-bikes through a daily, weekly or monthly subscription, represent about 28% of Zypp's revenue. The rest of the business serves courier, e-commerce, food and grocery delivery and ride-sharing companies such as Amazon, BigBasket, DHL, Uber, Swiggy, Zepto and Zomato. The startup's platform is used to make 5 million deliveries every month.
Zypp Electric has been working to expand its business – geographically and in terms of volume. The company had earlier planned to expand its fleet to 200,000 electric two-wheelers and enter 30 Indian cities by the end of 2025. However, Gupta told JS that the startup has decided to go deeper into the markets instead of launching in new cities with minimal presence.
The startup has also started offering electric three-wheelers in Delhi and Bengaluru and plans to expand to Mumbai very soon. The three-wheeler fleet already contributes to 10% of the startup's total revenue, the co-founder said.
Today, Zypp has around 15,000 electric two-wheelers in Delhi, 5,000 in Bengaluru, 1,000 in Mumbai and 500 in Hyderabad.
“The idea is to go deeper into these markets while launching a new market every quarter,” said Gupta. The company plans to expand its fleet of 22,000 electric two-wheelers to 50,000 in the coming year. According to Gupta, the company wants to further expand to a fleet of 200,000 electric two-wheelers in the next two and a half years.
In February last year, Zypp Electric raised $25 million in a Series B round led by Taiwanese battery swapping company Gogoro. It also counts Goodyear Ventures, Google for Startups and Shell E4 among its top backers.
Gupta said Zypp Electric is already operationally profitable and on track to become EBITA (earnings before interest, taxes and amortization) positive within six to eight months and post-tax profit within 12 to 14 months.
