Taxi industry and transportation of people in general have been revolutionized by Uber, its Estonian competitor Taxify and other companies which introduced mobile applications for taxis. But even this market is extremely vulnerable, as you cannot skip traffic jams with those applications. Some companies, such as GoBee Bike, Obike, Ofo and Mobike came up with bike sharing ideas to offer a new product to transportation market. However, Taxify, Estonian transportation company which was founded in 2013, is not going to let these greener and healthier technologies take over the market.
Taxify is expanding its business by offering electric dock less scooters named Bolt. According to Taxify CEO and co-founder distance per ride of twenty percent of Taxify rides is less than 3 km. Therefore, company wants to introduce alternative transportation vehicle to these customers and attack new market as well by rolling out its first fleet of scooters in Paris. Even though company has several competitors in Paris it has an advantage of customer data base who are currently using their app. Moreover, it can offer several different transportation methods via one application. Soon company is going to expand to other European cities, where Taxify app is highly used. Customer will be able to find e-scooter on the map of the application, scan QR code on the scooter and use it. Ride will cost 15 cents per minute with a minimum fare of 1 Euro. Taxify will recharge and maintain all scooters every night.
Whether e-scooters disrupt transportation market remains to be seen. In my opinion, the industry is ready for big changes and consumers are waiting for new technologies to revolutionize it again. Maybe we should watch for changes in public transport, cars, scooters or market will introduce something brand new. We will find out soon.
References:
Jill Petzinger, September 2018, https://qz.com/1380986/ride-hailing-app-taxify-is-joining-the-e-scooter-fray-in-paris/
Kate Clark, September 2018, https://techcrunch.com/2018/09/05/taxify-is-entering-the-e-scooter-game/
Shona Ghosh, September 2018, https://www.businessinsider.nl/taxify-launches-dockless-electric-scooters-for-hire-in-paris-2018-9/?international=true&r=US
