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Hotel chain Oyo Rooms has said it would raise US$ 1 Billion from Japan’s SoftBank Vision Fund and other investors, making it India’s second-most valuable start-up after Paytm. The US$ 1 Billion will be infused to fund the expansion into China and other global regions.
The company said that the existing investors including SoftBank Vision Fund, Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners will put in US$ 800 million, with commitments for another US$ 200 million. About $600 million of the total will be ploughed into China where Oyo began operations only about 10 months ago.
Ritesh Agarwal, Founder and CEO of Oyo said in the statement, “With this additional funding, we plan to rapidly scale our business in these countries, while continuing to invest further in technology and talent.” he added, “We will also deploy fresh capital to take our unique model that enables small hotel owners to create quality living spaces, global.”
“Oyo has grown exponentially to become the largest hotel chain in South Asia, and is swiftly expanding to international markets,” said Munish Varma, partner, SoftBank.
Oyo, according to the company, has more than 125,000 rooms in India and about 87,000 in China across 171 cities. Oyo is also said to be present in more than 350 cities across the five countries and claims to host more than 125,000 stayed room nights every day.
