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Exclusive: Ather Energy raises $34.5 Mn; co-founders invest over $10 Mn

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Electric scooter maker Ather Energy has raised Rs 286 crore or $34.5 million through debt and equity. This is the first round of investment for the Bengaluru-based company this year. Stride Ventures invested Rs 200 crore via debentures while co-founders of the company Tarun Sanjay Mehta and Swapnil Babanlal Jain pumped in Rs 43.28 crore each via Series F preference shares, its regulatory filings accessed from the Registrar of Companies show. Ather Energy raised its second-largest funding worth Rs 900 crore ($108 million) from existing investors Hero MotoCorp and GIC through right issue in December last year. In the same month, Hero MotoCorp also acquired an additional 3% stake in Ather for Rs 140 crore (approximately $16.8 million). Recently, a media report said that Ather is in talks to raise $95 million in a pre IPO round. Another report added that Ather’s existing backer Sachin Bansal has sold a significant portion of his stake in the company to Zerodha’s co-founder Nikhil Kamath. As per TheKredible, Ather was valued at $750 million during the Series E round in May 2022. However, it has not disclosed its valuation since then. It’s likely to get unicorn status in the upcoming round. Ather has raised around $450 million to date. According to the startup data intelligence platform TheKredible, Hero MotoCorp is the largest external stakeholder followed by Sachin Bansal, Caladium Investment, and Tiger Global. Ather’s revenue from operations surged 4.36X to Rs 1,784 crore in FY23 while its losses spiked 2.5X to Rs 864.5 crore in the same period. The company is yet to file its financial results for FY24. Electric two-wheelers saw a 50% drop in overall sales in April when compared to March. Ather Energy, which sold 17,000 units in March, saw 4,000 units sold in April. Ola Electric sold over 33,000 units, contributing about 50% to the overall sales in the last month.