The essence of this new Ola Ad is summed up when Supriya Pilgaonkar says, “Main Tere Liye Nahi Aaye, main apne Tupperware ke dabbe lene aai hu.” The ad not only touts the safety precautions the cab-hailing app offers, but it also plays on mother-son relationships for a fun.

The Coronavirus pandemic isn’t over While we’re in ‘unlock’ mode, we must also keep this in mind, and we should step put only if it is necessary. It’s exactly what Varun Thakur, who plays Pilgaonkar’s son in the ad, repeatedly stresses while pulling her leg about her tech prowess. “I think I should open tuition classes to teach moms how to use their phones,” he says.

The ad was conceptualized by OML (Only Much Louder). In this ad, we see the regular mother-son relationships that have played forever. The son, who is living alone, fails to remember ‘daal’ names and asks his mom. He can’t find his boxers and again asks his mom. He teases his mom about her ability to use a phone, she has a smart comeback. You know the usual drill by now.

The interesting part is when Thakur falls sick and video calls Pilgaonkar to ask how one makes ‘kadha’ at that time we see the deep mother-son bond. Pilgaonkar drops everything and visits her son with ‘kadha’. While sipping it, he asks her how did she manage, because it’s not safe outside. She then shows him a self-shot video. In it, she describes how she took an Ola and all the safety features it offers.

In the self-shot video she refers to Ola’s ‘5 Layers of Safety’:

• Drivers and customers must wear masks at all times.
• All exposed areas of the cabs are cleaned before every ride.
• All cars are fumigated thrice every week.
• Drivers have regular temperature checks.
• There are protective screens between drivers and passenger seats.

Ola has released several ads to highlight its new safety protocols to suit the new normal. Last week, it encouraged people to book an auto via its app, while extolling the safety features it offered.

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Due to the pandemic, the travel industry suffered a great revenue loss as people were restricted from traveling anywhere. But with the country slowly returning to normal, people are still concerned about safety which makes them vote against public transportation and rather prefer personal transport.

Conceptualized by Leo Burnett, in this 56-second commercial, an office scenario is shown where a woman’s colleague sounds like he will be late for the meeting and prefers to take an auto to make it quick. So she recommends he take Ola auto as they have now improved their standards to make transport possible with a reduced fare.

The autos are now sanitized before every ride and disinfection protocols are strictly followed thrice every week. A protective shield is kept between the driver and the passenger. The drivers go through regular temperature checks and the drivers must wear masks and gloves for a safe commute.

“Slowly, people are stepping out. Work is picking up, but with necessary restrictions and precautions. Ola’s ‘5 layers of safety’ campaign is a way to ensure that the passengers move about with a sense of confidence. We wanted to make sure that these safety features come across in an authentic manner. People will have doubts, but there will always be those who will help bring in a sense of conviction. The conversation between the work colleagues is intended to reflect that. We made sure that the conversation was reassuring and aptly indexed on the specific codes of safety. In times like these, safety and caution are a priority and that’s why Ola Auto’s ‘5 layers of safety’ needed to be voiced out in a humble, yet reassuring way,” says Amod Dani, Executive Creative Director at Leo Burnett.

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The launch of the Protect Range of surface disinfectants is a move towards bolstering that purpose. Adhering to the norms of this ‘new normal’, Marico Limited aims to drive meaningful partnerships within the ecosystem to provide the best in class hygiene solutions to corporates and service providers.

There is a significant shift in consumer behavior towards adopting conscientious safety and hygiene practices due to the global pandemic. This has led to a steep surge in demand for personal, domestic, and out-of-home sanitizing and disinfecting solutions. Moreover, as the unlock eases and people venture outside the comfort of their homes they are focused on alleviating hygiene and safety concerns.

Marico announces its partnership with India’s leading mobility platform and one of the world’s largest ride-hailing companies, Ola, to help them continue to offer safe mobility services to all. Ola will provide The Protect range to the driver-partners and it will be used by them to disinfect commonly used surfaces like the seat, inner panel, handles, etc before every ride. This partnership is poised to further Ola’s Ride Safe India initiative that has been launched to ensure strict adherence to safety and hygiene protocols thereby enabling the customers and driver partners to experience safe and best in class mobility services.

Marico has also partnered with HDFC Limited, India’s premier housing finance company where Marico’s Protect range will be instrumental in safeguarding their customers and employees in offices across India. The Protect range will help create a hygienic and sanitized work environment for both HDFC employees and the customers who walk into their offices.

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Before working in Ola, he was the Senior Advisor in WestBridge Captial Partners and worked in Executive position in Unilever from 2004 to 2017. He also worked in Reebook India earlier in 1996. During his time in Ola, he led the marketing department, category management, and supply management of the Cab company in India and other places. 

It is also said that Sanjiv Reddy, the Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs has also stepped down from his position in recent times. Reports show that the company has undergone a massive revenue loss in this lockdown as transport is vastly restricted all over the world. The revenue has decreased by 95% and the company had to lay down around 1,300 employees due to this pandemic.

Following this sudden news, Ola has issued a statement telling that both Arun Srinivas and Sanjiv Reddy has moved on from Ola to pursue other opportunities and that the company wishes them all well in their future endeavors.

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Ola’s customers across the country can now pay for their ride using PhonePe. The move is in line with Ola’s commitment to continuously introduce convenient, reliable, and innovative solutions in order to enhance the mobility experience while being fully aligned with PhonePe’s goal of making payments easy, secure, and accessible to all. Users can now access PhonePe on the Ola application itself. The feature as of now is available only on Android devices and will soon be available on iOS too.

This partnership enhances Ola’s recent safety initiative, Ride Safe India, which encourages its customers to opt for digital payment channels so as to minimize risk and ensure a zero-contact commutation.

Digital transformation being the new trend in the industry, this integration between Ola and PhonePe will enable thousands of customers to experience the unique and convenient payment system.

Speaking about the partnership, Anand Subramanian, Spokesperson at Ola, said, “As we navigate through the pandemic, we have noticed a significant increase in the adoption of digital payment solutions. With commute being one of the largest spend categories for customers, we wanted to encourage this shift through value-added services to ensure them superlative as well as safe mobility experiences. As PhonePe continues to drive digital payment adoption across the country, we are excited to partner with them to drive this seismic change that will enable us to move a step closer to becoming a Digital India.”

Ankit Gaur, Director, Business Development at PhonePe, added, “Facilitating safe contactless payments is of paramount importance during these tough times. We are excited to partner with Ola, to enable a seamless and convenient payment experience for our customers. This partnership will be a key enabler to drive India’s digital payment ecosystem.”

As part of the introductory offer, customers can avail up to Rs 200 in cashback on the first two rides when paid using PhonePe.

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Both Aggarwal and Bhati, recently received 2,56,038 equity shares at a nominal price of Rs 10 per share, the fresh allotment being a part of an agreement with Ola’s investors in the past where its backers agreed to incentivize them on completion of a defined threshold. These new issues are usually given to keep the founders motivated even as they dilute their holdings during fundraising.

The entire allotment is estimated to be of Rs 544 Crore with Aggarwal receiving 176,646 equity shares worth around Rs 375.4 crore while Bhati being allotted 79,392 shares worth Rs 168.7 crore.

Counted among a few dozen successful entrepreneurs, they have successfully added a few hundreds of crores to their personal net worth increasing the value of their stakes in Ola which is already worth several thousand crore rupees.

In December 2019, having a valuation of $6.2 billion (about Rs 44,000 crore) of Ola, Aggarwal and Bhati raised Rs 2,244 Cr from Korean automotive giants Hyundai & Kia Motors, by diluting their stakes. At the time, the value of each share was priced Rs 21,250. The same share value has been used to arrive at the value of fresh stocks allotted to the co-founders. The fresh allotments have now strengthened their holdings again.

Besides their stake in Ola’s core cab-hailing business, Aggarwal and Bhati also owned 25.17%  and 11.52% respectively in Ola Financials at the end of FY19. Ola also has a separate electric vehicle business called Ola Electric, incorporated in 2017. Unlike ANI Technologies (owner of Ola) and Ola Financial Services, Bhati is not a shareholder in Ola Electric.

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The eventual fate of mobility is electric, and the post-COVID world presents an open door for us to quicken the reception of electric mobility universally stated by Bhavesh Aggarwal.

Etergo was established in 2014. It has created App Scooter, an electric bike that has won a few honors over the world for plan and designing. First uncovered in 2018, the bike utilizes swappable high vitality thickness batteries to convey a range up to 240 km and class-driving quickening.

Following the acquisition Bart Jacobsz Rosier, Co-founder, and CEO, Etergo BV mentioned that the Bengaluru based Ola is one of the most prestigious names in the industry of mobility and it has marked its name with a lot of innovations and also made many bold moves taken towards electric mobility. The company is looking towards new heights while working with Ola and are positive to set new standards.

On the other hand, Bhavesh is very positive about his deal with Etergo now they can tap the markets at a must faster rate as almost twice the number of two-wheelers are sold across the world compared to cars.

The company after its current acquisition plans to indulge European and Indian techniques to reform and transform the Ola Electric market consisting of a 100-million+ global two-wheeler market, and a 20-million Indian two-wheeler market into clean energy and digital future.

The company will be running its vehicle on road by 2021. This acquisition will prove to be profitable for Ola Electric as it will bring together the engineering, manufacturing and design capabilities of both the companies and which can be ultimately brought into use for leading automobile companies like Tesla, General Motors, Ferrari, Jaguar, and BMW.

Etergo will continue its business from Amsterdam in the meanwhile Ola Electric has been working with several power distribution companies towards developing an EV ecosystem with charging and battery swapping stations across Delhi-NCR

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