Iporanga and Wayra lead US$818,000 investment in mobility startup Voll

Contxto – Brazilian mobility startup Voll is going places—literally. Thanks to its recent investment for R$4 million (around US$818,000) through co-leading investors Iporanga Ventures and Wayra it can act on its expansion plans. 

Coronavirus has caused drops in ride-hailing trips. This has directly impacted Voll‘s revenue model as it relies on users to request trips to third-party companies through its platform. But there might be a light at the end of the ride-hailing tunnel.

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Voll versus ride-hailing pricing

It’s common for users to have more than one ride-hailing app installed on their phone. And more than once they’ve opened them to simultaneously compare pricing and see which platform offers the best deal.

When the money for these trips comes out of their own pocket, they’re cautious about costs. However, when it comes to business trips, people can be careless if the company is paying. It’s in those scenarios that Voll rolls in.

To save business resources, Voll consolidates ride-hailing platform pricing onto its own application. Its system also lets managers oversee expenses, set budgets, and time limits for when staff use a ride-hailing service for company-related trips.

Through its product, Voll states businesses can reduce corporate transportation expenses by over 30 percent. Meanwhile, the startup charges its customers for every ride-hailing service they make through its platform.

• Related article: How does a ride-hailing startup for corporate employees survive the quarantine?

Keep growing and perfecting

Note that the B2B (business-to-business) startup’s platform is already running in 60 countries. However, it wants to enhance the way it works in these markets.

“We aspire to expand the company as a whole,” explained Luciano Bradão, Voll’s Founder. 

“Today we serve the whole world. We already have our users but we lack a structure that for example connects a company in Europe with the management needs of the European market and that’s something we’re interested in.”

In other words, it wants to tailor its product to the transport standards and requirements of the countries in which it operates.

For Iporanga, Voll’s customer portfolio of big names like PepsiCo and IBM was a major selling point. And despite the coronavirus’ impact on ride-hailing services, this investor believes Voll’s has something valuable to offer and that shall outlive the pandemic.

A ride-hailing rebound?

When it comes to controlling coronavirus, the world isn’t out of the woods just yet. However, some ride-hailing companies report that they’re starting to recover. Here’s what they have to say:

• Lyft: says rides rose 26 percent last May, compared to April in the United States.
  
• Didi: announced its ride-hailing requests have recovered in China to pre-pandemic levels.
  
• Uber: states that trip requests in May were down around 70 percent in comparison to May of 2019. However, it’s an improvement over last April’s 80 percent fall. In any case, the company’s CEO says things are improving on a week-over-week basis.

In any case, it’s a good thing that Voll operates beyond Latin America where the pandemic is still in its ugliest phase and ride-hailing requests shouldn’t rebound anytime soon.

Related articles: Tech and startups from Brazil!

-ML