Lyft to shop for taxi app Separate Now for $200 million to amplify into Europe

U.S. ride-hailing company Lyft on Wednesday introduced that it’s purchasing Ecu taxi app Separate Now in a 175 million euro ($199 million) offer.

The corporate mentioned that the purchase — Lyft’s first in Europe — is predicted to alike in the second one part of 2025, and that, as soon as mixed, the 2 corporations will handover over 50 million mixed annual customers.

Based in 2009 as myTaxi, Separate Now’s a ride-hailing platform headquartered in Hamburg, Germany. The corporate has been collectively owned by means of German automobile giants BMW and Mercedes-Benz since 2019.

The app is to be had in over 150 towns throughout 9 international locations, together with Eire, the U.Ok., Germany and France. Past conventional taxi and ride-hailing products and services, Separate Now additionally deals alternative mobility choices together with e-scooters, e-mopeds and e-bikes.

The startup is earnings-positive at the foundation of Profits Earlier than Passion, Debt and Amortization, producing improper bookings over 1 billion euros in 2024, in keeping with an organization truth sheet.

Obtaining Separate Now will give Lyft a path to amplify into the extremely aggressive Ecu ride-hailing marketplace, the place it’s going to arise in opposition to the likes of Uber, Estonia’s Bolt and Israel’s Gett.

Lyft’s closest home rival, Uber, has a long head get started at the company, having first introduced within the U.Ok. again in 2012. It has since been beset by means of a line of regulatory problems.

London’s shipping regulators attempted to restrain Uber two instances over protection issues. The corporate was once ultimately awarded a unused license to proceed working within the town in 2022.