Although there’s been plenty of talk about ride-sharing service Uber filing for an initial public offering, there’s still no official news on that front yet. However, the company did announce today that it has raised more capital in yet another financing round.
Uber announces latest funding round
In a blog post on the company’s website, a spokesperson for Uber noted how quickly the company has been growing. One year ago, the ride-sharing service was offered in 60 cities in 21 countries, but now it has grown by six times to operate in more than 250 cities in 50 countries.
Uber expects to generate more than 1 million jobs around the globe next year. In order to keep growing, the company raised another $1.2 billion in financing, “with additional capacity remaining for strategic investments,” according to the post.
Uber valued at a whopping $40 billion
According to Bloomberg, this latest funding round places a value of $40 billion on Uber Technologies. Just six months ago in another funding round, Uber was valued at just $17 billion. At that time, Uber was already the second highest valued venture-backed startup in history after Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB).
The ride-sharing company has significantly closed that gap with Facebook in only half a year, as Facebook’s valuation before it went public was $50 billion. Uber is also now valued at more than Tesla Motors Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA), which has a $29 billion market capitalization.
Uber did not name any of the investors that participated in this latest round of financing. However, last month Bloomberg News reported that T. Rowe Price Group was negotiating become one of Uber’s new investors, as was Fidelity Investments.
Uber issues other debt
Fortune‘s Dan Primack reported today that Uber filed to sell $1.8 billion in new preferred stock in Delaware. He cites a document first noticed by VC Experts. His story was posted before Uber’s blog post, and his source reportedly said the company is currently in negotiations with investors for more funds to bring the final total closer to $1.8 billion.
According to Bloomberg, which cites unnamed sources familiar with the matter, Uber is also issuing over $1 billion in convertible debt to clients of Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE:GS). In exchange, those clients receive the opportunity to purchase a six-year bond that converts into equity at a 20% to 30% discount to Uber’s valuation at the time of its initial public offering.
The sources also said Goldman Sachs group isn’t investing any of its own money in the debt. Along with the convertible bonds comes a coupon which increases over time if the ride-sharing service hasn’t held its IPO within the next four years.
