Ola Consumer’s Race Against Time

Ola Consumer's collapse has seemed inevitable for a while, and a valuation markdown this week has turned the spotlight back on to the beleaguered ride-hailing platform

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In the summer of 2021, Bhavish Aggarwal was arguably India’s most audacious tech entrepreneur. 

Ola Cabs (now Ola Consumer), the ride-hailing behemoth he had founded along with a fellow IIT Bombay engineer Ankit Bhati in 2010, commanded a healthy market share in India’s ride-hailing sector. 

Backed by SoftBank, Tiger Global and Temasek, it raised $139 Mn at a valuation of $7.3 Bn in late 2021, perhaps the last major round in what was the peak year of funding for Indian startups.

And that’s before the big push with Ola Electric that followed in the next few years. Aggarwal was somewhere near his peak as an entrepreneur in 2020 and 2021. 

What has followed over the next five years is a cautionary tale. 

Ola’s extraordinary ambition has collapsed from institutional neglect and rivals saw the gap left behind to capitalise. All the while Ola Consumer slipped further and further into irrelevance. 

Ola’s extraordinary ambition has collapsed from institutional neglect and rivals saw the gap left behind to capitalise. All the while Ola Consumer slipped further and further into irrelevance. 

On June 3, 2026, Vanguard, one of the world’s largest asset managers and an early Ola Cabs investor marked down the value of its investment, and valued the company at just $70 Mn. From the $7.3 Bn peak, Ola’s valuation has seen a 90%-plus haircut.

And when considering that last year, Vanguard’s valuation estimate for Ola........

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