Didi Chuxing Technology Co., the country’s biggest ride-sharing company, closed a $4.5 billion fundraising round that attracted $1 billion from Apple AAPL, -0.33% and $600 million from China’s top life insurer, according to people familiar with the situation.
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In addition, China Merchants Bank has committed to become the lead arranger for a syndicated loan facility to Didi of up to $2.5 billion, the company said.
Founded in 2012, Didi dominates the Chinese market with an 87 percent share of the market for private car-hailing in China and operates in 400 cities working with more than a staggering 14 million drivers delivering 11 million rides a day.
The latest funding values the company at $25 billion. The funding was raised at a valuation of $28 Billion, compared to $16.5 billion as of past year.
The battle between Uber and Didi for global investment allies has only intensified in recent months. “Today we do more trips in China than the United States”, said Emil Michael, Uber’s chief business officer.
Uber, which entered China about one and half years ago, said Chinese users had completed almost 1 million trips via the app in countries outside China in the first five months this year.
China is a big market.
China Life Insurance Co Ltd also added a long-term debt investment of about $300 million.
Didi, which was formed previous year by the merger of two rival Chinese taxi-hailing apps, is backed by influential domestic and foreign investors.
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That puts the ride-hailing company above U.S. short-term rental giant Airbnb Inc. and a step closer to Uber, the world’s most valuable closely held company which is worth US$68 billion, Bloomberg reports.
