Multi-Jurisdiction Valuation for a Pre-Revenue Shared Mobility Platform

Three entities, one valuation

Some engagements are straightforward. This was not one of them.

A shared mobility platform on a Transport-as-a-Service model was preparing to exercise a call option to acquire the remaining interest in its Middle Eastern subsidiary. That single decision triggered three simultaneous valuations: the Canadian parent, the 99.98%-owned subsidiary operating under local civil law tax rules, and the derivative instrument itself — the call option.

The model

Cash flows were projected to 2032 — not an arbitrary horizon, but the point at which the tax amortization benefit reaches stable rates and a terminal value can be responsibly applied. The TaaS revenue model was built around three customer segments with probabilistic site growth curves and ARPU schedules. Mid-year discounting was applied consistent with a year-end valuation date, requiring a leap-year adjustment.

The capex structure required particular attention. Management’s initial model reflected only growth capex — new assets added as the platform expanded. With a three-year useful life on the primary operating asset, sustaining capex had to be modelled separately: the cost of replacing assets as they cycled out, tracked in parallel with their associated revenues and costs so the forecast logic could be traced cleanly.

The Middle Eastern subsidiary ran under local civil law rules throughout: loss carryforwards expiring after three years with NOL utilization timing tracked explicitly, transport vehicle amortization on a straight-line basis under the applicable depreciation schedule. A separate WACC input set the country risk premium for the subsidiary independently from the parent.

The ownership split — 99.98% of the subsidiary’s cash flows, 100% of the parent’s own — was built in with a flexible input so any future change to the ratio would flow through automatically. Engagements like this rarely end with a single use of the model.

Twenty-four questions

An independent senior CBV at a major Canadian accounting firm reviewed the work and issued 24 written questions. Each was answered. Some were corrections absorbed without debate. Most were positions already taken correctly — the documentation made them defensible, not just asserted. The reviewer accepted the model on the second pass.