Bengaluru-based Lithium Urban Technologies acquires SaaS platform SmartCommute

Lithium Urban Technologies, India’s leading first zero emission transport service, has acquired 100% stake in SmartCommute, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that provides end-to-end transportation services to corporate employees, according to ETAuto report.

The acquisition enables the B2B fleet operator foray into the SaaS domain as a new business vertical to scale up its presence in the multi-billion dollar corporate employee transportation industry. However, Sanjay Krishnan, founder, Lithium Urban declined to divulge details of the deal size.

“Until now, the team at Lithium was into analytics as the technology was used as a means to achieve efficient logistics for our fleet. We never sold software-as-a-service to our clients. We are now foraying into SaaS as a new vertical that will help us better capitalise on the potential of EVs in corporate employee transportation once the market bounces back to normal,” he said.

According to Krishnan, while the demand for shared mobility is down as people continue to work from home amid the Coronavirus pandemic, this is a good time to plan and build the product and consolidate on required technologies in order to be ready when the demand comes back in the future.

Founded in 2014, SmartCommute was developed for simplifying employee transportation services for the corporates.

“SmartCommute was managing about 30,000 – 35,000 employee rides daily before COVID-19. We have more than 3,000 vehicles on the platform and we have handled employee transport for several large IT companies across more than 10 cities in India,” Ajit Patil, co-founder, SmartCommute, said.

With this acquisition, SmartCommute will have Lithium Urban’s EV fleet on its platform enabling it to offer the corporates emission-free rides. Lithium Urban will gain access to the SmartCommute’s customers and to new segments including freight and rapid bus transit, and a large fleet of internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles. These will consolidate its presence in the B2B transportation services.

“Nothing changes for the companies that are already using SmartCommute. The acquisition will enable EVs on the SmartCommute platform. We will integrate our own systems with SmartCommute so that it is able to offer and manage rides across electric and non-electric vehicles,” Krishnan said.

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