ANI Technologies Ltd., the parent of mobility platform Ola Cabs, has decided to restructure the roles of its key leaders, close on the heels of two senior executive putting in their papers, chief executive officer (CEO) and co-founder Bhavish Aggarwal told employees in an internal memo on Tuesday afternoon.
Ola’s chief financial officer, Swayam Saurabh, will leave in mid-December, while Ola’s chief operating officer, Gaurav Porwal, has also resgined, according to the internal memo, a copy of which Mint has reviewed.
As part of the restructuring, Anshul Khandelwal, who was appointed as Ola’s chief marketing officer in March will be taking on the additional responsibility of driving consumer revenue for Ola Cabs, according to the memo. Further, to drive better synergies, Ola’s group chief finance officer, G R Arun Kumar, who joined the company earlier this year, will overlook the finance function across all group companies, with all key finance leaders at Ola now reporting directly to Kumar.
Vinay Bhopatkar, who was responsible for the deliveries business of Ola, which includes food tech and new ambitions such as groceries and hyperlocal, will be assuming additional responsibility for the driver and supply ecosystem of the mobility business, Ola Cabs.
Ola has seen some high-profile exits in the last two years. Ola’s founding partner, Pranay Jivrajka, called it quits to work on his new startup early this year. Last year, Ola Electric co-founder, Ankit Jain ; Ola's chief business officer Sanjay Bhan; and Ola Financial Services CEO, Nitin Gupta quit the company.
Ola, meanwhile, is planning to re-enter the online groceries and hyperlocal business, in the coming months, as the company looks to up its fight against food tech giant Swiggy and hyperlocal task platform, Dunzo. It had shut down its grocery arm, ‘Ola Store’, in March 2016.
It is expected to announce plans around these newer lines of business, in the coming months, two people told Mint. Both did not wish to be named.
“Over the last year, we have re-architected our mobility business to be much more robust and structurally efficient, enabling strong and a rapid return to pre-covid levels. Our vehicle commerce business, Ola Cars, has scaled up rapidly to become a large operation, and our Delivery and Financial Services businesses are at key inflection points. As we look forward to Ola’s next phase of growth, we are making some key updates to our organisation that will enable us to capture the opportunities that lie ahead,” said Aggarwal regarding the restructuring in the internal memo.
Currently, Ola Group consists of the company’s electric vehicle manufacturing arm, Ola Electric and its recently launched used-car buying and selling platform, Ola Cars. The group also houses its payments, insurance and lending business under Ola Financial Services and its food delivery business Ola Foods.
“Ola has diversified into new businesses in recent years and is undertaking restructuring to drive further synergies between its mobility and new lines of business. Through expanding the roles of leaders, it now looks to better structure the organisation,” said one of the above persons who was aware of the discussions.
The restructuring comes at a time when Ola is looking to file its draft prospectus, to raise between $1.5 - $2 billion through its public listing on the domestic exchanges next year, Mint reported earlier. The company is targeting a valuation of almost $18 billion through its domestic listing.
In July, Temasek Holdings and Warburg Pincus invested $500 million in ANI Technologies Pvt. Ltd, which runs Ola. Aggarwal also participated in the round. He currently owns a 7.9% stake in the 11-year-old company, according to researcher Tracxn.