DLA Piper has advised leading Chinese car services and rental company Yestock Car Rental Company Limited ("Yestock") on a share equity financing and strategic cooperation with Didi, a major Chinese car-hailing, ride-sharing, artificial intelligence and autonomous technology conglomerate backed by Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu.

The equity financing from Didi and other investors will provide Yestock capital support to continue its business expansions.

Founded in 2005, Yestock offers car sales, long-term rental, leasing and second-hand car management services. It owns over 20,000 vehicles and is currently operating in more than 160 Chinese cities. According to a recent market research report, its fleet of vehicles is the largest amongst car leasing companies in China, and it is also the second largest service provider in China's long-term car rental market.

Didi is China’s largest ride-hailing platform and currently has over 450 million users across over 400 cities in the country. It receives over 25 million orders on a daily basis. Its global investment network includes Grab, Lyft, Ola, Uber, 99, Taxify, and Careem, serving over 1,000 cities or more than 60% of the population worldwide.

Based on this strategic cooperation agreement, Yestock vehicles will be available for hire or lease to Didi's full-time drivers. The venture will allow both companies to provide multi-aspects of value-added services to customers and to further expand in the internet car-hailing and car services markets in the country.

The DLA Piper team was led by Hong Kong-based Corporate partner Melody He-Chan, assisted by of counsel Janny Tai and associate Gary Chan.