Over the past week, Lyft has been in the news after it was reported that the ride hailing company has been looking for a buyer.
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Apple was recently in talks to take a stake in Lyft, the No. 2 ride-hailing app in the USA, as part of a “strategic partnership” that could pose a fresh domestic threat to Uber, sources told The Post. Lyft had reportedly approached a who’s who of tech firms including Apple, Alphabet and Microsoft, but came away without a deal from any of them.
He called the news reports, which characterized Lyft’s meetings as “us wanting to sell the business”, as significant mischaracterizations.
According to a report by Business Insider, Mr. Zimmer said that the company was not searching for buyers; it was rather approached by other companies which gave everyone the wrong idea. Rumors that Lyft is discussing a potential acquisition with General Motors, Amazon, Didi Chuxing, and Uber, have been floating around for quite some time. As of January 2016, Lyft has a value of $5.5 billion with a cash pile of $1.4 billion.
Lyft’s Zimmer claims that the company has a fiduciary duty to evaluate all offers made to the company.
As Fortune’s Dan Primack points out, Lyft went through the steps of hiring an investment bank and opening a special “data room” so potential acquirers could look at the books and do due diligence on the company.
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That’s happened multiple times throughout our business. “It’s actually more of a normal course of business than has been portrayed, and of course we have to review anything that’s of legitimate interest”. A report from Recode late last week suggested Lyft was seeking as much as billion in a buyout. “I think it shows a bit of overstepping on Uber’s part. that fully demonstrates who is behind this”, he said. Rumors then started circulating that Lyft was seeking a buyer including Apple, Uber and others. Although Zimmer believes this rivalry makes it easy for outsiders to view the company as bitter, he mentioned that he and the company are happy with Lyft’s current trajectory. “I don’t think [independence] is a requirement, but I believe right now it’s the best path”.
