Report: Cabify holds acquisition talks with Lyft, looking for up to $3 billion [UPDATED]

_ Lyft has replied to our request to say that “we don't comment on rumours and speculation.”_

_ Cabify has issued a statement to “categorically deny the rumours about alleged conversations in relation to the sale of the company.”_

_“ has not been meeting with managers of this or other companies to negotiate a possible partial or full sale of Cabify,” the statement continues. “The company is in an unbeatable state of financial health and sustainable growth, and continues to establish itself in a leading position in the markets in which it operates. As referred, the company remains committed to following the established path, aiming to enter the Spanish stock market in the next 12 to 24 months.”_

_The original story is below:_

The ridesharing company Lyft is in negotiations with Madrid-founded Cabify to acquire it for up to $3 billion, Spanish-language newspaper El Confidencial reported today. The deal would supposedly grant Cabify the resources needed to compete with players like Uber and Didi in Latin America, while widening the geographic reach of Lyft, which currently only operates in the US and Canada.

According to the sources of El Confidencial, Cabify and Lyft have been in acquisition talks for several months, which involved a visit by some of the US-based company's top executives to Madrid. The price point that's allegedly being considered is close to $3 billion. The final decision could take months to be made, the report says; if the parties were to agree on the deal, it would be announced by mid-2019.

Speaking to El Confidencial, the founder and CEO of Cabify Juan de Antonio neither confirmed nor denied the acquisition possibility.

“The only thing we are going to say is that we remain committed to our roadmap to go public in the next 12 or 24 months,” he added (automatically translated from Spanish).

Since both Lyft and Cabify are planning to go public in the near future, the alleged acquisition deal would strengthen their positions on the stock market.

Lyft might not be the only party interested in swallowing the Spanish company, though. El Confidencial's sources pointed out that the team of Uber's new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has also contacted Cabify to talk about acquisition possibilities.

The alleged conversation with Uber never moved much further, though, supposedly because of an intervention from Rakuten. The Japanese behemoth holds a stake in both Lyft (20 percent) and Cabify (40 percent) and would supposedly be happy to see them merge.

We've reached out to Cabify and Lyft and will update the story with their comments as we receive them.