WhistleDrive raises fresh funds from Colosseum

Hyderabad-based WhistleDrive said on Thursday that it has raised ₹72 crore from Chicago-based Colosseum Group under its Series B round of funding.

The company, which provides technology-enabled fleet services to corporates, now plans to enter two new cities to add to the three where it currently operates.

Rakesh Munnanooru, founder and chief executive, WhistleDrive, said the company has a fleet of over 700 vehicles across Hyderabad, Chennai and Bengaluru. “We are looking to enter Pune by coming January and February. With the series-B funding we just got, we are looking at scaling vertically, and plan to enter the National Capital Region (NCR),” he said, on the sidelines of a press conference.

Munnanooru said WhistleDrive runs about 100,000 vehicle trips each month. With the latest round of funding (series-A was ₹5 crore in April 2018), the company, which had a revenue of ₹15 crore in 2018-19, is looking to scale up its fleet as well, he said without elaborating.

Munnanooru said Whistle Tech, developed by the company, allows corporates to automate the entire transportation process resulting in cost savings and also experience a reliable, comfortable and secure ride to work, according to a company statement.

WhistleDrive’s offerings include ‘Whistle Fleet’—a technology-enabled fleet, ‘Whistle Shuttle’—a B2B shuttle service for last-mile connectivity and point pick-ups and ‘Whistle 360o’—an end-to-end transport management service.