It’s now starting to get a tad ironic that the car-sharing service Lyft — which I often call Not-Uber (sorry, nice Lyft guys, but true!) — has added yet another international investor to its list, even though it only operates in the U.S. and has curtailed plans for overseas expansion.
Only-In-U.S. Lyft Continues Global Investor Expansion With Saudi $$ Infusion
Will this new investment by Prince Alwaleed bin Talal give car-sharing service a lift? (Get it?)
Nellie Bowles
This time, it’s Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia, who has sunk money into a variety of Silicon Valley investments, including Twitter. He and his Kingdom Holding, as well as other investors, bought just over 5 percent of the San Francisco startup at a valuation of just under $5 billion.
While that might seem like a lot, that compares to Uber — which does operate in Saudi Arabia — and its $65 billion market value.
As you may know, Lyft got a previous slug of money from China’s ride king Didi Kuaidi and also struck an Avengers-style alliance with it and other global players to battle Uber’s Ultron stylings.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
