BlaBlaCar is an iconic name in the French startup ecosystem. The carpooling and bus ticketing company has been around for so long that it’s hard to think of it as a startup anymore. However, BlaBlaCar is an extremely interesting company today because of its unique trajectory.
What started as a scrappy online hitchhiking community became a startup that raised hundreds of millions and reached unicorn status. It then expanded to many countries on many continents, then scaled back its ambitions and started thinking about profitability.
Today, the company announces that it has secured a €100 million ($108 million at today’s exchange rate) revolving credit facility. This will give it a new war chest to plan for the future and continue to drive growth — including through acquisitions.
“Debt is a tool that is relatively attractive, non-solvent and also highly flexible,” Brusson told us. The €100 million credit line belongs to several major banks based in France, the UK and the US
BlaBlaCar does not pay any interest at the moment as it has not yet reached its debt limit. But Brusson said he plans to use that debt facility to acquire smaller companies. As many startups struggle because they can’t raise their next round of funding, BlaBlaCar will be able to step in and acquire these smaller companies.
Profitable for the last 24 months
Although BlaBlaCar is not a public company, it is slowly accepting that it can share some metrics more publicly. In doing so, BlaBlaCar can reveal for the first time that it has reached profitability — in fact, it has been profitable since April 2022.
The milestone should come as a huge relief, as 2023 was a tough year for French startups – unless you’re working on AI products, of course.
“The whole business is profitable. We’ve been profitable for almost two years,” co-founder and CEO Nicolas Brusson told TechCrunch. “2022 was the first almost full year after COVID, except for maybe the first two months. We recorded revenues of 195 million euros. And we ended up basically slightly negative for the year, but that was really because Q1 was horrible.”
“But from the second quarter of 2022 onwards, we were profitable. Then, in 2023, our revenue jumped to over €250 million. So we’re experiencing just under 30% in top-line growth and still being profitable.”
Profitable can mean different things to different people. Many companies like to claim they are profitable, even though they talk about EBITDA — a financial measurement that does not take into account the costs associated with a company’s assets. And Brusson is a little fed up with companies that pretend to be profitable and actually lose money every year.
In BlaBlaCar’s case, the company was profitable on an EBITDA basis, but it also makes a net profit all things considered — BlaBlaCar doesn’t own cars or buses anyway.
In 2023, 80 million passengers booked a bus or group car ride on BlaBlaCar. And the good news is that there are BlaBlaCar users all over the world — not just in France.
“Brazil is bigger than France in terms of the number of users. And I think India will be bigger than France for the number of carpool rides next year,” Brusson said.
The company hasn’t yet started monetizing its users in India, Brazil, Mexico or Turkey — it doesn’t get a cut of carpooling transactions. It will gradually add booking fees, which will also help increase the company’s revenue.
A wrinkle is Russia. When the war in Ukraine started, BlaBlaCar had millions of users in Russia. While many tech companies have decided to sell their Russian subsidiaries, BlaBlaCar’s Russian operations have been completely separated from the rest of the business, but BlaBlaCar has no plans to sell it. Brusson argues that this would be counterproductive, as it would effectively mean giving it to a Russian-based owner.
“Today, it’s just under 5% of revenue, so it’s pretty small. It’s still part of the group, but it’s completely isolated and run independently… The company is completely cut off from the group. But if you want to sell it, in today’s context, it’s like giving it away.”
Add train tickets
In Europe, BlaBlaCar wants to bring together all ground transportation methods. In addition to carpooling and bus rides, the company plans to add train tickets. Users will be able to purchase tickets sometime in the next year.
“The idea for us is to combine it with carpooling. So we’ll be able to offer train travel plus carpool — almost door-to-door,” Brusson said.
Even if you’re not booking your next train ride on BlaBlaCar, the company is also experimenting with last-mile carpooling. “In this case, we have a different model for slightly shorter distances. The idea is to connect train stations to your destination. Usually, if you get to Vannes station, you often need to get to your grandma’s house, your holiday home, your weekend getaway. You still have between 10 and 40 km,” he noted.
As there are already many BlaBlaCar users driving in that direction, the company will ping those drivers to see if they can pick up a group of people at the train station and drop them off at their destination.
In non-European markets, bus routes represent the biggest opportunity. “The good news for us in these markets is that buses remain a very offline and fragmented industry,” Brusson said. He pointed out that people are spending billions of dollars on bus tickets in India and Brazil – suggesting that, once again, there is room for BlaBlaCar to grow.
