František Peterka sells Driveto, his fourth startup exit

František Peterka, one of the best-known Czech names in e-commerce and startups, has definitively parted ways with car rental service Driveto — the company was bought by the TibiQ group. It is already the fourth company in his career that he has built and sold.

The 43-year-old Peterka was in at the founding of Driveto back in 2017, launching the project together with investors from the Miton group. At the time he owned 40% of the company and the North Bohemian investors held 60%, but his stake shrank over the years as Miton made further investments, eventually falling to 13%.

Peterka left Driveto in 2019 — by then the company was already managing a fleet of hundreds of cars, and it needed professional management with experience in that kind of business. “It needed a different business model, and that wasn't really my strength,” the entrepreneur admits.

After leaving Driveto, he worked as a consultant on business strategy, international expansion and digitalization for companies in the Miton portfolio, as well as for the brands Crocodille and Vekra. At the same time he was developing his own travel service, Explorio, which helped families with children find holiday accommodation. The project launched just as the COVID-19 pandemic began, which seriously slowed its growth. Explorio was eventually bought out by colleagues who had been helping Peterka with the project — his third exit from a business.

In 2024 Peterka unexpectedly returned to Driveto — this time as the company's head, to relaunch it. Now, after selling the company to TibiQ, the entrepreneur talks about a well-earned break: “Right now I'm taking a breather. Time to think, time for family, time for hobbies.” Still, by his own admission he's not good at sitting idle for long — the break will most likely last only a few weeks.