NeoFleet Raises $4 Million to Expand Taxi-Fleet Financing

TechCabal reported that NeoFleet Capital raised a $4 million pre-seed round to expand taxi-fleet financing in Africa and other emerging markets, giving the Cyprus-based company fresh backing for a model that combines vehicle credit with operating control.

DMTech VC, a venture fund focused on fintech and asset-backed finance, joined private investors in the round.

Mark Loughran, previously president and chief financial officer at ride-hailing company inDrive, invested in the financing and took a leadership role at NeoFleet as president and co-founder.

The round includes both equity and debt.

The company operates in Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Peru, where professional taxi and ride-hailing fleets often struggle to secure traditional vehicle finance.

World Bank data compiled by TheGlobalEconomy put vehicle prices in Sub-Saharan Africa about 8% above the global average in 2021, with an index reading of 107.74 against a benchmark of 100.

NeoFleet’s existing network covers 650 vehicles, and their combined purchase value is about $10 million.

Founded in 2024 by Igor Shiyanov and Oleg Mosyazh, the company backs professional mobility operators rather than lending mainly to individual drivers.

The new capital is tied to a specific expansion target.

NeoFleet plans to reach 1,000 vehicles across its network by the end of 2026 and 5,000 by the end of 2027.

At that scale, the fleet would represent an estimated $75 million to $100 million in vehicle value.

Its Fleet Management Franchise model packages several functions around the vehicle asset: funding, day-to-day fleet tools, operating support, servicing and insurance.

The software layer is designed to rate fleets and drivers, follow vehicles through telematics, track status, organize servicing work and control payments.

NeoFleet does not use the same ownership structure in every market.

Some deals provide secured financing to established fleet operators that buy and own vehicles themselves.

In other cases, NeoFleet purchases vehicles and rents them to local operators.

It also uses instalment-sale structures in which operators acquire vehicles and pay over an agreed period.

Revenue comes from interest and fees on financing, along with rental income from vehicles NeoFleet owns.

The company expects the franchise model to add software, maintenance, insurance and other fleet-service revenue as it builds more control around financed assets.

Risk controls are central to the model because the underlying customers often have limited bank access.

NeoFleet conducts due diligence and credit assessments before financing operators, uses ride-hailing platform relationships and market data to identify established fleets, insures the vehicles and uses location and status feeds to monitor assets.

When a fleet operator misses payments, the first step is to assess whether the delay can be fixed through a cure plan or revised schedule.

If that process does not work, the company’s security rights and asset tracking are intended to help recover the vehicle and place it with another operator.

The financing gap has drawn larger rivals such as Moove and Autochek, but NeoFleet is also positioning the same operating stack for a longer-term shift toward autonomous fleets.

Its view is that driverless commercial fleets would still need capital, coverage, charging access, repair capacity, live monitoring and daily asset operations.

NeoFleet is reviewing a pipeline of more than 15 countries and expects to choose two or three new markets for the next phase.

The company will keep expanding in Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Peru while its broader search covers Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and the Middle East.