
BlaBlaCar raises $200M at $1.4B valuation - mraison
http://www.forbes.com/sites/liyanchen/2015/09/16/meet-europes-newest-unicorn-blablacar-raises-200-million-at-1-4-billion-valuation/
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jakozaur
One of the example of startup that is huge success in Europe, but in USA
similar models aren't that successful (Zimride pivoted to Lyft, Ridejoy
closed).

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briandear
Raising money doesn't make one a 'huge success.' When they have profits or an
exit, then we can discuss success parameters.

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MartinMoizard
No one said that raising money means success. BlaBlaCar is considered a big
success for several years now, simply because the service is used and really
appreciated by thousand of people.

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Shivetya
I don't see it. So they compare a ride via BlaBlaCar to the train but are
there additional hidden costs? Is that 20 Euro fee the money paid to BlaBlaCar
or the person you are riding with? Is there some understanding of paying the
driver more for fuel? Really I don't see the valuation as they clearly state
they are not there to generate profit for those offering the rides. Unless
there is expected to be some sort of change where costs go up I still see
people simply short circuiting the system should the price go up.

Also, where is liability? Uber was fine until it started making a dent in
established businesses. This hasn't yet but will get notice because of the
headlines.

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seren
You are paying through the app, the driver gets most of it, and Blablacar
takes a few percent. Regarding the price, I think the application is
recommending a price given the distance, gas price, possibly the type of car,
and availability. But ultimately the driver is free to set any price.

Historically they launched with home-work travel, but as you mentioned, after
a while people were short circuiting the system. On longer, occasional, travel
there are much less chance that you will ride twice with the same person.

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dandlift
Source? I had a few trip with blablacar and I always paid in person. There was
this legend that this was the case only for the Italian market, but you had to
pay through the app in other countries. But as far as I can tell the platform
works the same in Italy, UK and France. I once had a trip from London and
again, I paid the driver directly.

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seren
This is from hearsay, but from what I understand from the (french) site you
are paying Blablacar when reserving, and then you give a code to the driver
IRL before the ride, so that he/she can redeem the payment. So you don't pay
"directly" the driver.

Here is a link to the UK site : [https://www.blablacar.co.uk/faq/question/how-
are-the-booking...](https://www.blablacar.co.uk/faq/question/how-are-the-
booking-fees-calculated-and-what-do-they-cover)

So the booking fee perceived by Blablacar is about 10% of the cost of the
ride.

It is possible you used an earlier iteration or that different market have
different prices. It is very possible booking is free in new markets.

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chrisan
For anyone curious of the name as I was

[https://www.blablacar.co.uk/blog/our-story-
continued](https://www.blablacar.co.uk/blog/our-story-continued)

[https://www.blablacar.co.uk/blog/are-you-a-
blabla](https://www.blablacar.co.uk/blog/are-you-a-blabla)

Members are asked to rate how chatty they are from bla to bla bla bla

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cylinder
I'm surprised so many are willing to trust a random stranger's driving
especially on long rural roads, which are more dangerous. I would not even
trust a licensed livery driver for this, or even most friends.

It's amazing how people are willing to hand total control of their lives to
people they know nothing about.

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DigitalSea
This is crazy. Before this article, I hadn't even heard of BlaBlaCar before.
Seems ride sharing is still a market with lots of potential to raise copious
amounts of venture capital.

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orbifold
It is sort of well known in Europe.

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heelhook
Incredible well known, I'd say. Pretty much all of my friends, techies and
non-techies, have used it repeatedly. I'm not too surprised about this
valuation.

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bshimmin
Sample of not very many? I'm based in the UK and I've never heard of it
before. Perhaps all my friends are using it and never mentioning it to me,
though!

(I checked to see if it does operate in the UK, and it seems to.)

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RobertoG
Count me like another sample. A lot of my friends use it. I think that at this
moment is very strong in the continent: Portugal, Spain, France, Germany,
Poland

So, the valuation is not so strange, except that the business model is not
clear to me. In the other hand, I could say that about a lot of others
startups.

~~~
heelhook
I think the business model is fairly straightforward. People offer rides in
exchange for money. Blablacar pockets a small percentage of each ride.

I believe they used to not charge a fee until about a year ago but they do
now.

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cJ0th
They still don't charge anything in Germany.

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briandear
This poor company will go the way of Daily Motion if Hollande stays president.
Any decent exit will get blocked. Either that or they'll leave France before
they are exposed to the risk.

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sdoering
And in what way does this incoherent anti-government rant further the
discussion?

You could (and maybe rightly so) argue against a lot of policies. But without
providing any background even someone from Germany, like me, has probably no
way of following your thought process.

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madaxe_again
I have an idea! No execution. Can I have my $20bn yet?

When did profitability become irrelevant to investors?

I assume from the downvotes you collectively have some kind of secret as to
how they intend to end up profitable? Not revenue. Profit. Revenue is vanity.

If they're valued at $1.4bn, at a reasonable multiplier, I guess they're
profiting $500m/yr - right? Right?

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Fradow
I'm going to answer because it seems no one else bothered.

You are being downvoted because calling Blablacar "just an idea, no execution"
is like telling Dropbox is "just an idea, no execution". Blablacar have
executed very well, with a customer acquisition phase (when it was free), then
stepped up the monetization (gradully stepping up fees, while keeping a
healthy customer base). They also began expanding out of their home country
(France), which is no small feat considering cultural differences.

On the profitability part, what makes you say they are not profitable already?
I can't really extrapolate numbers, but a good customer base + recurrent fee
(for each travel) generally are good signs for a business. I would bet the
raised money is to fund expansion in other countries (I am pretty sure at
least one of the previous round was for that).

