Author Bio : Anand
Rajendran
is the Co-Founder and CEO of Snoota, one of the top android app development
companies in Chennai. He is a passionate
blogger & SEO Specialist who write articles on various topics . Snoota is a
software product developed by his company that has launched Taxigen script which is a Uber Clone Script with Android and
iOS apps.
When the ridesharing companies like Uber, Lyft and
Didi Chuxing are trying to expand their operation in overseas, Ola- the Indian
on demand ridesharing service plans to dominate its domestic market in its
home. The company announced about launching a new shuttle service costing one
dollar.
Unique from
its competitors
One of the fastest moving economies in Asia is the
Indian economy that has 1.3 billion population and has increasingly evolving
middle class societies who are armed with disposable income and smartphones.
The online transportation company is backed by investors like DST Global and
Softbank reported that the initial project is available in two major cities,
Gurgaon and Bangalore. The project was activated from Sept 21st,
2016 that has five hundred shuttles covering one hundred routes and the
expansion of the project in other cities will be announced in the following
quarter.
The Vice President of New Initiatives at Ola, Sundeep
Sahni was the cofounder of the Lazada, Rocket Internet before joining the
online car hailing company. He said the main aim of the new project is to
attract the commuters who opt to ride in their bike, cars or auto-rickshaws.
And the cost of the fare is one dollar, which is comparatively lower than
hailing the private taxis that cost about four to six dollars.
New shuttle
service
The shuttle service is shared among the twelve to
twenty people and has many other facilities like in- vehicle entertainment,
Wi-Fi access and air conditioning. The
CEO and cofounder of the transportation company, Bhavish Aggarwal said that
millions of people in the country use their own transport for the daily
commute, so the company plans to target those people and offer them a reliable
and comfortable commute experience just by the click of a button from their
smartphone, thus bringing in effectiveness at scale. It also benefits the
people who work with the ridesharing company and provide efficient mobility for
the millions of people in the country.
The initial service has one hundred shuttles covering
twenty routes, and does not work like the regular Ola service when it comes to
the corralling suppliers. The shuttle service will either be with the limited
fleets that will be smaller than the service that links the riders through the
app or it will be independent traders with their vehicles. While the riders can
use the mobile app to track the shuttle on the map using the GPS service and
book the seats and pay for the trip.
The future
of the car sharing company
The company’s plan to establish the shuttle service
came in April when the car hailing company raised four hundred million dollar
funding from Series E round, and the overall fund estimates to six hundred and
eighty million dollars. The company already had plans of investing the funds in
scaling up the company in the market. The Vice President for New Initiatives of
the company said that they will use a minimum of fifty million dollars for the
new project.
The app service is live in more than a hundred cities
in the country that covers the auto- rickshaws, traditional taxis and other
vehicles. They also serve each day with more than two hundred and fifty
thousand vehicles that are registered under the company offers seven hundred
and fifty thousand rides. On an average the company registers one thousand five
hundred new vehicles a day. The company also has plans of venturing into the on
demand food delivery market after the launch of the food delivery service by
the American ridesharing company, Uber.
Online
transportation rivals in home market
The San Francisco based ridesharing company is the
biggest rival for Ola in India and the expansion of the operation and business
anticipates many people in the transportation industry. According to the report
from the Softbank, the company bags eighty percent of the market share that
provides a big opportunity for the company to experiment different programs in
the country. While the local ridesharing rival, Meru covers twelve percent of
the market.
However, there are many other car sharing companies in
the country that might launch a service similar to the new shuttle service. In July,
Meru introduced their carpooling service and similar service was offered by
TaxiForSure- which is owned by Ola. In 2015 BlaBlaCar entered the Indian market
and even they offer ridesharing service. The online ticketing platform RedBus
focuses on the commute between the cities; however there are also chances for
the company to expand their service, especially on the shuttle service.
As of now there is no shuttle service in India and Ola
is the first transportation service to introduce the shuttle service and so it
has a huge advantage in the Indian market.
Market view
of the new service
The bike taxis in Indonesia like Grabbike, GoJek and
BlueJek transport both the goods and people. The ridesharing company is in the
advanced stage in the financial round with five hundred million dollars that
gives a chance for the company to shutdown the competitor’s business by
venturing the riding business in new industries.
According to the current situation the shuttle sharing
service is in its initial stage with market players in each stage of the
project, and there are a lot of benefits of introducing the shuttle sharing
service like more efficiency, less pollution and limited vehicles on the road. There
are some private services that operate exclusively in one city like Shuttl that
provides service in Delhi NCR, ZipGo that serves in Bangalore and in Mumbai we
have the Cityflo.
Company’s
recent projects and plans
The share
service: The service was confirmed by the company in April
when they received investments from the investors of about four hundred million
dollars and other investments from other sources that makes it a total of six
hundred and eighty million dollars. The service went live from September 21st
in two cities.
Application
interface: The online ridesharing company opened its application
interface for the developers and allowing them to integrate the services of the
platform into the mobile app. So, the application interface lets the platforms
to integrate with the ride info like the availability of the ride, tracking the
vehicle, booking system and the estimated time of service based on the
transportation network’s data. Similar kind of application was introduced by
the leading online transportation company of the United States, Uber.
Masking the
number: The ridesharing company introduced a new feature called
the number masking feature, according to which the user’s phone number is not
disclosed to the driver. And the phone calls made by the driver will be
recorded and saved in the company’s database in India. The ridesharing provider
has integrated a cloud telephony service that sends the number in an encrypted
form to the drivers and the communication is routed to the cloud number. This
feature helps the company to protect the user info.
Car leasing
program: When the company received two hundred and twenty five
million dollars from its new and existing investors, it introduced a new
leasing program for the drivers with a minimal monthly deposit and over three
years the driver can own the vehicle. The program was launched in Chennai,
Bangalore, Hyderabad and three more cities in India.
Loyalty
program: In Bangalore under a specific program, the riders who
chose Ola Prime gets a superior car with free Wi-Fi service driven by the best
rated drivers. Apart from Bangalore, the program was available in Chennai,
Pune, Jaipur, Delhi and Hyderabad with the drop service through SUVs and Sedan.
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