Israeli public transport optimization startup Optibus has raised $40 million in a series B financing round led by Insight Venture Partners and with the participation of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, the "Financial Times" reports. The company has raised $54.5 million to date, including this latest financing round. Existing investors, including Verizon Ventures, Pitango Venture Capital, New Era Capital and Sir Ronald Cohen, also participated in the round
The company uses advanced artificial intelligence and optimization algorithms and has developed a SaaS platform to enable mass transportation companies in more than 300 cities and drives some of the most complex and large-scale transit operations worldwide, helping improve quality of service and efficiency, reduce costs, streamline operations and reduce congestion and emissions.
Headquartered in Tel Aviv, the company has offices in San Francisco, London, and Düsseldorf. Optibus was founded by CEO Amos Haggiag and CTO Eitan Yanovsky and has 75 employees.
Haggiag said, "Every city on the globe runs a multi-million to multi-billion dollar mass transit service, yet the operations rely on outdated software and manual practices to plan, optimize, and run transportation. This wastes resources and delivers poor passenger service. On the other hand, rapid innovations in urban mobility are pushing transportation providers to modernize, and Optibus creates the technology infrastructure that can ensure better performance from the passenger's point of view."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on December 12, 2018
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