Chinese app joins financing of Ola app

Chinese ride-hailing app Didi has joined investors in funding Ola app, following its own financing of $3 billion earlier this month, the company said on Monday.

The funding, which also includes money from GIC, Falcon Edge, Tiger Global and Softbank, came after Didi invested $100 million in US ride-sharing service Lyft earlier this month, and joined a $350 million financing round for Grabtaxi, which is widely used in Asia, Xinhua news agency reported.

Lyft and Grabtaxi are considered to be Uber's arch rivals in their respective regions.

Ola currently holds an 80 percent share of India's ride-hailing market, with 320,000 vehicles in more than 100 cities offering over 750,000 rides each day, Didi said in a statement.

Ola recently announced a $754 million expansion to boost its presence in India. An initial investment of $75 million will be used to boost its driver numbers by 100,000 by the end of next year.

Didi now has the lion's share of China's online transportation services, accounting for 99 and 82 percent of the country's taxi-hailing and ride-on-demand services, respectively.

It has also expanded its offerings to customised shuttle services and car-pooling amid growing competition with Uber and friction with domestic regulators over the legitimacy of its ride-on-demand services.

China's China Investment Corp. and Ping An Ventures joined its $three billion placement, which put the value of the Chinese start-up at $16.5 billion, Didi CEO Cheng Wei said.