Intel on Monday announced the acquisition of Israel-based Moovit, a mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) solutions company, for approximately $900 million.
The acquisition of Moovit will assist Intel’s Mobileye to improve sales by achieving its plan to become a complete mobility provider, including robotaxi services. Industry reports say that robotaxi services is forecast to be an estimated $160 billion opportunity by 2030.
Intel bought Israel-based Mobileye in 2017 for $15.3 billion. Intel in December bought Israel-based artificial intelligence company Habana Labs for $2 billion.
Intel CEO Bob Swan said: “Mobileye’s ADAS technology is improving the safety of millions of cars on the road, and Moovit accelerates their ability to revolutionize transportation.”
Moovit has leadership in the MaaS space with more than 800 million users and services in 3,100 cities across 102 countries. Mobileye is the leading automotive solutions partner that enables advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) deployed on nearly 60 million vehicles with more than 25 automaker partners.
Moovit will join the Mobileye business while retaining its brand and existing partnerships. Moovit, founded in 2012 and is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, with approximately 200 employees. Nir Erez is the co-founder and CEO of Moovit.
Moovit has achieved a seven-times increase in users in the past 24 months. Moovit has also signed strategic partnership agreements with major ride-sharing operators and mobility ecosystem companies for analytics, routing, optimization and operations for MaaS.
Moovit has raised $133 million from investors including Intel, BMW iVentures, and Sequoia Capital. In 2018 it raised $50 million in an investment round led by Intel Capital.
The price paid was nearly twice the $500 million valuation when Moovit last raised money in 2018. Intel owned about 7 percent of Moovit through a previous equity investment and paid about $840 million in cash to assume full ownership, Reuters reported.