Re:Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Resigns as C.E.O.
by henrikschroder on Wednesday June 21, 2017 @04:00PM
(#14607357)
Counterexample: Taxi companies in Stockholm developed hailing apps before Uber. Most of them already had location services for mobile phones so you could call their voice system, and there was an option to get a cab to your current location if you were calling from mobile. I presume there was a cooperation between the mobile carriers and the taxi systems so they could pull that info.
Their first hailing apps was simply an extension of this, but it used the phone's gps, and you would press a button in the app for "a taxi, now, here", but the underlying systems were at least already there.
After Uber entered the market, they made their apps better, and you can now attach a payment method to pay through the app, and there's gps tracking of the car you're waiting on, same as Uber and similar.
But Stockholm never had a medallion system or other caps, and there's no monopoly, but there is some sort of oligopoly where some companies get better access to major taxi destinations such as airports and train stations. As usual, healthy competition is the key. :)
Their first hailing apps was simply an extension of this, but it used the phone's gps, and you would press a button in the app for "a taxi, now, here", but the underlying systems were at least already there.
After Uber entered the market, they made their apps better, and you can now attach a payment method to pay through the app, and there's gps tracking of the car you're waiting on, same as Uber and similar.
But Stockholm never had a medallion system or other caps, and there's no monopoly, but there is some sort of oligopoly where some companies get better access to major taxi destinations such as airports and train stations. As usual, healthy competition is the key. :)