Lyft acquires FinitePaths

US based ride hailing services Lyft has acquire Pune based startup FinitePaths for an undisclosed sum as it follow its larger rival Uber in tapping India’s large talent base to solve its global technology problems.

Uber opened its technology development centre in Bengaluru in February 2016, with the mandate to build solutions for the local market which could then be exported to other markets. The company ‘pay-by-cash’ model which was built out of India is now available in several Southeast Asian Markets. Apart from Uber, it’s Southeast Asian rival Grab recently announced its plans to setup a research centre in Bengaluru where it would employ 200 engineers that would largely work on payment technologies.

Similarly Indonesian bike taxi service Go-Jek has acquired three Indian startups – Pianta, C42 Technologies and Codelgnition to shore up talent for its development centre here. The top management of Go-Jek India centre comes from local service Ola which pioneered the ride-hailing market in the country.

Go-Jek acquires LeftShift Technologies

Indonesian Bike hailing app Go-Jek has acquired Pune based app development company LeftShift Technologies Pvt. Ltd for an undisclosed amount to strengthen its product development efforts, making its fourth acquisition of an Indian firm.

It helped more than 200 companies design and develops mobile apps, including companies such as BookMyShow, Practo, OYO, Byju’s Classes, Airtel and Emerson. It also counted Go-Jek as one of its customers. The product development centre, which has about 60 employees now, comprises developers, data scientists, designers and product managers who work on mining data and delivering better experiences for consumers.

Go-Jek had earlier acquired Bengaluru-based home healthcare start-up Pianta in August. In February, the firm announced that it bought Bengaluru-based software engineering company C42 Engineering India Pvt. Ltd and Delhi-based development and operations company CodeIgnition Software Solutions Pvt. Ltd for engineering talent. These deals are so-called acqui-hires, which is jargon for an acquisition made to gain access to the employees of the acquired company.

Go-Jek offers stock options to the employees of its acquired companies that vest over four years. Go-Jek was started by Harvard graduate in 2011 and is the first Indonesian start-up to achieve the “unicorn” status after a $550 million funding round in August led by KKR and Warburg Pincus.