Cooperation Minister Amit Shah addressed Parliament regarding the challenges faced by Bharat Taxi, a government-backed cooperative ride-hailing platform, including competition from established private aggregators and resistance to digital adoption among drivers.
Police in Thane, Maharashtra, have arrested a man suspected of murdering a ride-hailing driver. The victim was reported missing earlier in the week, and his body was found in Pune district.
Two of the three strikes are related to the gig economy, a centrepiece of the new labour Codes.
Electric cab-hailing platform BluSmart remained non-operational on Thursday across Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru, and Mumbai, as the market regulator cracked down on its co-founder over alleged misuse of funds at an affiliated company. BluSmart app, that offered more than 8,000 taxis in the three metros, stopped taking bookings on Wednesday evening and remained unoperational on Thursday as well.
'Unless we consistently show up with the right cars, at the right time, priced fairly, we risk becoming irrelevant very quickly.'
There's a hint of new competition riding into a sector that has attracted attention for being in a duopoly-like situation. Rapido, a commute app known for its budget-friendly bike-taxi services, on Tuesday announced its entry into the cab market, which is currently dominated by marquee brands Uber and Ola. Rapido's cab foray will be enabled by a software as a service (SaaS)-based platform.
By 2025, Uber projects that 25,000-30,000 cars -- or 12 to 16 per cent of vehicle additions -- would be EVs, reports Surajeet Das Gupta.
The Delhi Police on Tuesday asked ride hailing firm Uber to verify past records of drivers before onboarding them and suggested that the company put a mechanism in the cab to check their alcohol consumption levels. While speaking at the safety feature launch event of Uber, Delhi Police additional commissioner Mahesh Chandra Bharadwaj said that drunken driving has been a major factor in case of rule violations. "If a driver is drunk then you should have some kind of mechanism to know that your driver is drunk. We test drunk and drive through the alcohol meter.
Ola and Uber said they have resumed services in areas within orange and green zones, and have introduced requirements like wearing masks to ensure safety of riders and driver partners.
Uber, Ola's main competitor in Australia, currently operates in 19 cities including Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and Canberra.
With a report on Uber by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) opening a Pandora's box, the company is in a damage-control mode. Distancing itself from the actions of its management pre-2017, Uber, while acknowledging the "mistakes" of the past, has said that under CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, it "is a different company". "There has been no shortage of reporting on Uber's mistakes prior to 2017.
The three companies - Ola, Hyundai and Kia - will co-create solutions to operate and manage fleet vehicles.
Since its launch in September, Ayushman Bharat has issued 20 million cards and has set an ambitious target to hit another 30 million within the next three months.
In the UK, Ola is the only app that offers black cabs and private hire vehicles, giving both the driver-partners as well as the users, more choice.
Uber Technologies said it is doing a fresh round of recruitment for its India tech centres and is planning to hire 500 more tech employees by December. The app-based mobility and delivery company has a 1,000-member tech team across its centres in Hyderabad and Bengaluru. The firm said the hiring plan is a testament to Uber's commitment to India, and its recognition of the engineering talent in the country. Uber hired 250 engineers to its India teams in 2021.
Ola, which is now present in seven cities in the UK, said its easy-to-use app would transform commuting experiences in these areas providing the community with greater travel choice as well as quicker and easier access to cabs.
Drawn in by fuzzy promises about unleashing the entrepreneur in each of us and the benefits of being one's own boss, people find themselves instead oppressed by an algorithm, notes Rahul Jacob.
As Indians start travelling in the new normal, strong recovery in smaller towns underscores success for ride-hailing giant's 'India to Bharat' strategy, which offers new products in regional markets.
The state government says Ola was using its existing cab aggregator licence to promote bike taxi services.
The controversy started a Twitter firestorm with many demanded the Ola to block his account. However, there were many who supported the man's 'right to choose'.
Uber launches initiatives to address drivers' woes on its 4th birthday
Ola has reported its first operating profit of Rs 89.82 crore for 2020-21, even as the ride-hailing company's revenue declined 65 per cent to Rs 689.61 crore amid COVID-19 induced lockdowns. As per regulatory documents filed by ANI Technologies - the parent company of Ola - it had logged standalone operating profit (profit before finance cost, depreciation, amortisation and tax (EBITDA)) of Rs 89.82 crore in FY21 on a standalone basis, while it had registered a loss of Rs 610.18 crore in the preceding fiscal year.
Using Microsoft's Cognitive Services, the selfie is compared to the one corresponding with the account on file. If the two photos do not match, the account is temporarily blocked while Uber looks into the matter.
While Ola will be restarting services in over 60 cities across the country from Tuesday, Uber, on the other hand, will restart services in 13 more cities from Tuesday, increasing coverage to over 35 cities.
The company has started verification of drivers and audit of its services.
Cab aggregators caught between showing profitability to investors, increasing their network and dabbling in areas such as food ordering have seen a major blow to their primary business.
Uber on Tuesday said it is laying off about 600 employees in India -- about a quarter of its staff in the country -- as business has taken a major hit amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The development comes days after rival Ola had announced laying off 1,400 people from its rides, financial services and food business.
The new Ola app will allow fleet owners to track their cars in real-time, view the performance of their drivers, and even their daily earnings
With its foray into self-drive, Ola will go head-to-head with early entrants Zoomcar, Revv and a few other.
United States-based cab service provider Uber has landed in another controversy with one of its drivers being accused of molesting a female passenger during a ride to Gurgaon.
Over the past week, several unusual partnerships among start-ups, traditional businesses and hospitals have been announced, and several more are likely to materialise soon. The trend could see increased importance of gig workers, who are taking considerable risk to deliver goods to people in the time of a pandemic.
Both are focused on the overall transportation business, in which taxi services are only a part; the extended ambit includes autos, motorbikes, cycles, electric vehicles, water transport as well as food delivery services, says Surajeet Das Gupta.
The company's India focus hasn't changed with the change in CEOs.
Kalanick, in a statement, said he has "accepted a group of investors' request to step aside so that Uber can go back to building rather than be distracted with another fight".
The new tranche of funding raises Ola's valuation to $5.74 billion from $4.45 billion in October 2017
The Ludhiana-born engineer is among the youngest entrepreneurs on TIME's 100 most influential people.
TIME said a record 45 people on this list are under 40 -- including the youngest designer ever, 14-year-old actor Millie Bobby Brown -- and a common theme in the tributes is how much people can learn from them.
Uber valued at $53 billion, is looking at more than 50 per cent market share in India by the first quarter of 2016.
Uber, Puma, Nissan, Britannia have already lined up for the upcoming parade of cricketing nations, looking to align with the game and its legion of fans
It was investing heavily in finding new ways to gauge driver behaviour apart from just relying on feedback provided by riders.
