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Uber seeks another billion in capital

In case of a successful round of financing, Uber has a strong chance to become the highest value private start-up, according to New York Times.

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Meanwhile, enterprise/government analytics and data visualization software firm Palantir has raised another 5M.

Why does a ride-hailing business that likes to claim it’s not a transportation company need such a massive money mountain behind it?

Last June, Uber was valued at $18.2 billion. Uber is valued at more than $50 billion at present. Uber, just 3 months ago, raised an enormous amount of capital from investors and apparently, the company is at it again.

We’ve reached out to Uber for comment and will update this story with any response.

Rather than going public, Uber appears focused on using its significant amount of funds to build out endeavors such as the delivery services, UberEATS and UberRUSH, the multiple passenger-inclusive UberPOOL offering and worldwide expansion in countries such as Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam and – in particular – China, which Kalanick recently cited (via the NYT story) as now being home to approximately 30 percent of all trips taken using Uber.

“We’re like eighth graders”. “Let us get into high school before we start talking about these sorts of things”.

The tactic could help the company raise its valuation by a lot.

Uber’s war-chest runs to more than $8 billion in confirmed financing rounds at this stage.

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Voices familiar with the subject stated that Uber aims to establish itself as a household name in China, where it faces a dire competition from Chinese ride-hailing service Didi Kuaidi.

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