Buy? Puh-LEASE: Uber partner, Fair, gets $385m to expand its leasing partnerships

The car-subscription serviced raised $385m in a funding round led by SoftBank, as it plans to trek globally into new markets.

California startup, Fair.com, wants to change the tides of the car market by providing cheap and easy options for people to lease vehicles instead of buying them — and yesterday was an acceleration in the right direction.

Buy? Puh-LEASE: Uber partner, Fair, gets $385m to expand its leasing partnerships

On Thursday, Fair raised a massive Series B funding round of $385m (led by, who else, SoftBank) to take its business global. 

An uber deal for an Uber partner

Founded in 2016, the car-subscription service buys used vehicles from dealerships and rents them from an app for a monthly fee.

Fair has worked with Uber, which sold Fair its $400m leasing portfolio, to supply its drivers with vehicles. Now, the company hopes to scale its business 10-fold by minting more ridesharing partnerships in other markets.

The car leasing company is already in 15 states and 26 markets in the US (reportedly adding a new city every week), with more than 20k lease agreements from users to date.

SoftBank knows exactly what it’s doing

SoftBank’s got some hard tickle tied up in the rideshare market, backing not only Uber but also Getaround in the US, Didi in China, Grab in Southeast Asia, Ola in India and more.

The company plans to use Fair to scale those businesses by helping connect more drivers with fairly priced vehicles in a swift timeframe.

While Fair wouldn’t comment on its exact valuation, the round puts the total equity raised in Fair at around $500m; some speculate the company’s valuation to be north of $1B.

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