Ola Electric Says It Controls Its Own IP, Including The Name ‘Ola’

Ola Electric Mobility Ltd. said it controls its own intellectual property, including the logo and wordmark ‘Ola’, amid reports that founder Bhavish Aggarwal wants to transfer the brand to his own family office.

As per a business transfer agreement entered between Ola Electric and ANI Technologies Pvt., the company holds “a perpetual, royalty-free, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-assignable, and revocable licence to use certain licensed IP, including the logo and/or wordmark of ‘Ola’," according to an exchange filing on Monday.

“This licence is granted perpetually in relation to the company’s electric vehicle business and is valid globally (across the universe).”

On Monday, The Economic Times reported that Aggarwal wants to transfer the Ola brand to his own family office, amid a planned group restructuring. ANI Technologies, which owns Ola Consumer (cabs, online food delivery and quick commerce), licensed the Ola brand to Ola Electric on a royalty-free basis, according to the report. 

ANI investors are therefore concerned that if Aggarwal owns ‘Ola’, they would be cut out of future value linked to the brand. It’s worth mentioning here that ANI Technologies has been trying to take Ola Consumer (formerly Ola Cabs) public for quite some time now.

To be sure, ANI Technologies used to be the holding company of the Ola Group, which included the electric vehicle business as well. In 2017, Ola Electric was carved out as a separate entity, not a subsidiary. 

Then, on Jan. 18, 2019, Ola Electric entered into a business transfer agreement with ANI Technologies to transfer the entire EV business on a slump sale basis for Rs 22 crore, according to the red-herring prospectus. The deal includes:

1. Development of electric vehicles for short and long distance rides. 

2. Developing and providing services across the electric vehicles value chain such as building infrastructure for facilitating the electric vehicles ecosystem in India. 

3. All R&D activities and materials in connection with the foregoing. 

4. All other business, activities and operations in connection with the foregoing. 

5. Purchased assets including third party and in-house developed intellectual property, hardware and software.

6. Employees

7. Contracts associated with purchased assets. 

8. All liabilities associated with the purchased assets, the employees and the transferred contracts. 

9. Grant of a perpetual, royalty-free, non-exclusive, non-transferable, non-assignable and revocable licence to use, across the universe, certain licensed IP, including the logo and/or wordmark of ‘Ola’, ‘Ola Cabs’ and www.olacabs.com under class 39, only in relation to the  EV business.

The RHP clearly mentions that Ola Electric Mobility does not have a holding company.

On Monday, Ola Electric shares rose 1.34% to Rs 49.24 apiece on the BSE even as the benchmark Sensex ended the day 0.37% higher at 80,796.84 points.