Taxi-Hailing Firm Gett Eyes 2019 IPO

Gett, a ride-hailing company that works with taxis, is planning an initial public offering later this year, The Financial Times reported.

The company offers transportation through established taxi systems rather than the minicab model used by Uber and Lyft, and it expects to become profitable later this year. It’s considering listing in Israel or on the London Stock Exchange, company Founder and CEO Dave Waiser said, per the report.

Gett successfully raised $130 million from companies that included Volkswagen, bringing its total amount raised to $700 million with a valuation of $1.4 billion.

Half of Gett’s revenue comes from business accounts, and about 20,000 companies use it as a taxi-booking service. The company sets up taxi drivers like black cabs in the U.K. or yellow cabs in the U.S., and that lets it position itself as a more upscale service, with drivers who are already accredited.

Waiser said he considered listing after noticing that Lyft was going to continue to float its initial public offering (IPO) despite losses. Lyft had $2 billion in revenue in 2018 but posted a net loss of $911.3 million.

“We will see how Lyft goes, we believe there’s a lot of public capital waiting for the [technology] darlings [Uber and Lyft], but we also believe that our business model makes sense,” he said.

The company said it’s booked “hundreds of millions” in revenue.

Gett’s corporate sales rose 54 percent last year and the company expects to have upwards of $1 million in profit by December, despite a loss of $3.5 million last December.

The company is better positioned in Europe, where it has been established longer, but it posted a loss of $2.4 million there. However, the company projects an even higher profit there by the end of the year.

“December will be positive, but the break-even will happen earlier than that,” Waiser said.

The money from an IPO will be used to invest in the company, the CEO said.