Ever since the inception of Uber, the ride-sharing apps has become a mammoth affair. Just like every other rising company, the San Francisco-based tech giant has faced its fair share of issues, competition and brickbats across the globe. Now, Taxify, the Estonian ride-hailing unicorn has relaunched its service under “Bolt” in London looking to provide a different take on the sector and challenge Uber’s dominance.
With Bolt, the company has promised low price for users and higher pay for drivers to challenge Uber on the market. Moreover, the company is planning to stay focused on Europe for now rather than chase expansion to the US.
“We made some mistakes and we basically had to restart the application process with TfL, which we completed two weeks ago,” chief executive Markus Villig told City A.M. “There’s so much room in Europe and Africa. We’ll remain focused on these markets for the next five years to come.”
In this regard, we have curated a list of ride-hailing apps, where Bolt will have to compete within London.
Uber
The first and biggest competitor in the town is of course ‘Uber‘. Founded by Garrett Camp, Oscar Salazar, and Travis Kalanick in 2009, the company operates in almost every part of the world — in North, Central, and South Americas as well as Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific.
Gett
Gett is a black cab-hailing app. The company is built on a simple idea – “if you treat drivers better, they will treat riders better”. Gett’s service is available in more than 120 cities worldwide, including London, Moscow and New York. In addition to it, the company’s service is used by more than 20,000 companies worldwide in over 1,000 cities and 56 countries. Notably, in 2018, Gett officially became a “Unicorn”, valued at $1.4 billion.
MyTaxi UK
Operating in various cities including London, Brighton, Edinburgh, Manchester, Nottingham, and more, the platform connects passengers and drivers with just two taps of the app.
Kabbiee
Kabbiee is a web platform and an app that allows users to compare prices and book minicabs in London. ‘Cab Hunter’ is an exclusive service for Kabbee account holders in a rush. If the best available quote has a pickup time greater than 20 minutes, Kabbee will try to find an earlier cab at the same price.
TaxiApp
Taxiapp differs from all the other taxi-hailing apps in that it is London’s only ‘work focused’ app that is wholly owned and run by the drivers themselves. Taxiapp allows passengers to book and pay for a black cab like they would through Uber. Rather than a fixed price, the fare is always decided by the meter.
According to the founders, “This is the only ethical taxi app among the competition – and the only one that gives black cabbies a fair chance against the aggressive pricing of Uber and similar apps.”
Addison Lee
Addison Lee is a private hire services company that provides services through its vehicles for passengers and couriering needs worldwide. It offers same-day, next-day, and international delivery services as well as mobile- and customer-focused technology services.
BlaBlacar
BlaBlaCar is a long distance carpooling platform that connects drivers with empty seats and passengers to share travel costs. In fact, members can even specify how chatty they are from “Bla” to “BlaBlaBla”, hence the name BlaBlaCar. The company aims is to create a global people-powered network with a trusted community of drivers and passengers.
Kapten
Founded in 2011 by Omar Benmoussa, Othmane Bouhlal and Yannick Hascoet in Paris, Kapten is one of the leading ride-sharing players in the country with 2 million users. Chauffeur Privé now has the largest fleet of independent drivers in Ile-de-France, with more than 18,000 drivers.
Wheely
Unlike other ride-hailing apps, Wheely is a luxury ride-hailing service, allowing customers to book chauffeur-driven journeys both on-demand and pre-booked through an app. Wheely currently operates in London, Moscow, St. Petersburg and Sochi.
Stay tuned to Silicon Canals for more updates in the tech startup world.
https://siliconcanals.com/news/startups/apply-for-social-impact-lab-2019-with-your-startup-or-scaleup-and-complete-your-social-mission/
01
From port to startup fort: How Lars Crama is ‘Making it Happen’ in Rotterdam